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Getting back to it (whatever it is).

This is not a Lionel Richie appreciation post. While I appreciate him and the joy his songs bring to my day when I hear them in a grocery store, I don’t think I have quite enough words about Mr. Richie.

While I kind of wish I could be writing about Lionel Richie, because it’s easier than being vulnerable about the fact that for a while, even though I really, truly wanted to write. I just couldn’t. I wasn’t even reading beyond what I needed to for work. And I’m kind of embarrassed to say that, because how could I call myself a writer if I wasn’t writing?

When I last wrote to you, I mentioned a creative set-back. Well, that creative set-back ballooned into a creative road block and then a creative crater, and I couldn’t figure out how to cross over it to the other side. I don’t want to call it writers block because I had ideas. I scribbled ideas in notebooks and on post-it notes. I sent ideas in subject lines to emails to myself. But that’s where it ended. For many years I’d funneled all my creative energy into writing. In high school, and my early 20s, I was someone who absorbed art in every way, and wasn’t afraid of making bad paintings, bad paper mache sculptures, bad doodles. I made art for the creative experience. I made art not because I thought someone would see it and give me an art show, or smother me with praise. I made art because I had to, because something inside me needed to get out in some kind of medium, regardless of the end result.

What happened to that girl? I wish I had an insightful answer to that, and maybe it’s just simply the hellscape and soul-killer that is capitalism/patriarchy etc. As a journalist, writing became my income, and wasn’t at all about art, but in the last decade I tried to merge art and writing, and found joy there. But as any artist trying to make money from their art knows, capitalism is incredibly good at creating self-doubt, rampant insecurity, and kills the joy in something that was once extremely satisfying and necessary for the body and soul.

Ok. So, that’s where I was at, and maybe to a lesser extent where I’m still at. But let’s fast forward to the spring/early summer. I’m sitting on my friend’s deck. We’re enjoying those dreamy moments where day melds with night. He has a cocktail in his hand, I’m sipping a sparkling water with lime. And he asks the question I dread, How’s the writing going? And because he’s one of my very best friends and an artist too, I confess it all. But then he said something, and I forget his exact words, but this is how I remember it maybe you just need to create, in any way. Spread it out and don’t worry about writing as the only creative outlet. For some reason, in that moment, it resonated deeply, like in that way where it holds on to every cell and fibre of your being.

After that day on his deck, I went on a month-long, magical, exceptional road-trip with my partner. We drove from our home on the Sunshine Coast in British Columbia, to San Diego and back. I kept a notebook. I took polaroid photos. I bought yarn. Ok, correction, I bought lots and lots of yarn. And we saw art. Ideas appeared again, as they had done for months, I jotted them down in my notes app on my phone, expecting they’d likely end up forgotten like the rest of my great writing ideas. But when I got home, I started spreading out my creativity. I signed up for drum lessons. I became a member of the fibre department of my local fine arts association. I’ve been learning to spin wool. I’ve been sewing, making cyanotypes, and exploring mixed media art. And friends, it’s been incredible. But the most incredible part, is in the midst of all this creating (which is still happening) the writing started to come back. And my relationship to it has changed. In the same way I feel unafraid to make messy art projects, I fell less obligated to write good, perfect sentences that must get published, and must be seen. I’m also exploring ways to bring the writing, and my pile of other creative projects together.

And while this all feels so so good, I’m also terrified that I’ll end up back in that creative void I found myself in. I made a goal for myself to submit work again this year. And I know this is something I want to do, I’m also afraid that the rejection and process of submitting will somehow set me back again. I’m trying to move forward little by little and overcome the fear that built out of my creative crater, and I think being vulnerable about it all my help too. Because something I’ve found is that artists of all mediums tend to carry a lot of the same worries and anxieties, and we don’t share them out of guilt (maybe?), shame (probably?), but also because where we are now in terms of social media (and culture in general), means we need to be bold and joyous about our successes and hide our challenges away.

I hope you don’t mind me sharing my challenges here. It feels a bit self serving, but I hope that maybe it encourages you to be bold in sharing your challenges too, because it’s part of the process. I wish I was making beautiful, perfect art all the time. But sometimes I make gorgeous sweaters, and all I can see is the wonky part on the sleeve where I didn’t pick up an even number of stitches. I look forward to seeing your challenges, to supporting my friends through them, and to celebrating the joys too.

I’m going to try and get back to a more regular schedule with this newsletter. I know it dropped off for a while. Hopefully, I’ll be back soon.

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Something to inspire:

I’ve been working with a mentor for the past few months to help me with some of the research skills and tools needed for a new project I’m staring. She suggested to me that writing into and around photos of my family members would be a great way to research some of the stories, ideas and memories I have. I personally love using pictures as story starters. I’m offering you this photo below, found from Flickr’s creative commons, to maybe kick start a creative project for you. Don’t limit yourself to words. Maybe it conjures an image you want to capture with paint, or a pencil and paper. Let this photo carry you away!

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Recommendations:

I’ve been listening to A LOT of podcasts, here are some of my recent favourites:

• Witch: This is an amazing BBC podcast that looks at the history of witches but also how we understand witches today. It’s a powerful and thorough podcast. The host is great, and this is one I’ll likely be listening to again.

• Hysterical: I think a lot of people know about this one because as the host says in the intro it has received acclaim as the best podcast on Apple podcast. This podcast uses one example of mass hysteria (perhaps?) to explore how hysteria has been portrayed and understood throughout history. Again the host is fantastic, and I actually ended up listening to other stuff he’s done solely because I like him!

• Art Juice: If you like candid and inspiring conversations between artists. I highly recommend this one. It’s hosted by two British artists Louise Fletcher and Alice Sheridan. I enjoy how they bring their own struggles and insights into different topics related to making art and being creative, with a lot of humour and fun.

If you’re interested in watching great things. I recently enjoyed

• Man on the Inside: Ted Danson won a Golden Globe for this, and it’s well deserved. I loved how it brought an element of mystery (because you know I love a mystery) with these tender and vulnerable stories of death, loneliness, and aging. And I found myself laughing a lot too.

• Your Fat Friend: This is a documentary that explores diet culture, fatphobia, and the fat activism of Aubrey Gordon. If you don’t know Aubrey’s work, you’re missing out! She is the host of another fabulous podcast called Maintenance Phase, and the author of two wonderful books including What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat.

Learning:

• Sometimes the social media algorithms get it right and recently I got an ad for the National Gallery of Canada. Did you know they offer FREE online art classes? They have a few coming up that look great including a mending your knits class. Find it here.