One Year of Goosebumps

It's been a year of re-wirement from the working world, a year of building my next life as a full-time painter, and a life of purpose beyond the daily grind.

I'll admit I'm still doing some job hunting, looking for something to help pay the bills until the plans and new directions I have in mind are up and running. I'm realistic about how long that can take, and somehow looking gives me a sense of security. I really don't want to do it, I just like to eat, travel, and buy art supplies, all of which take money, and I hate dipping into my hard-earned savings.

The challenges have been many. They carry real weight, and I've questioned my every step. This year I started a monthly blog, a monthly newsletter, and weekly social media posts, all of which take time and energy away from the studio. Then I added monthly grant applications, residency applications, and submissions to galleries, exhibitions, and competitions. It's been a lot. I started a business once before, in a previous life, so I know what it takes. But the world, the economy, and the technology have all gone into overdrive. Now it's the old-fashioned networking plus everything that's been piled on top of it.

There were some rewards, too. I sold three of my newest paintings, I'm working on a very large new piece (10' x 7') that's already on its second or third iteration, and I was accepted into the Santa Fe artist registry. I'm also waiting to hear back on several grants and residencies. Those are mostly a year out, so I keep applying so there's always some potential out there in the rotation.

On top of all that, I'm another year older, which comes with its own positives and negatives. The positives? I'm not a neophyte. I've learned a lot of lessons by now, and I can see my old triggers coming down the pike before they arrive, and hopefully step around them. I live by Portia Nelson's poem "Autobiography in Five Short Chapters." I walk down the street and fall into a hole. I stay there a while until I figure out how to get out, and eventually I do. The next day I walk down the same street and fall in again, but this time I get out faster because I know how. The day after that, I see the hole and walk around it. And the real change comes when I decide to take a different street altogether, so I never run into that hole again.

Thank goodness I've reached that point. I'm also old enough and wise enough to know the new street has its own dangers. But I know I can handle them, because I have some life lessons under my belt. I can honestly say I would never go back to being 20 or 30 again for anything. There is real beauty in aging if you practice acceptance rather than resignation. Resignation gives up; acceptance makes peace with what is and keeps going anyway. Aging comes either way, so being at peace with it, while doing everything you still want to do and living as fully as possible, is the most fulfilling approach.

The other positive, if you want to call it that, is that I don't have as many days left to dally. Another old saying goes, if not now… when? It's time for me to do this, to use my remaining energy and life force on the things that bring me joy. And I'll admit I want to leave behind a legacy of work, writing, and love that my family and the people I love will treasure.

Are there really any negatives? Probably not. But there are challenges. Doing the work while having the time, the energy, and the will to keep moving forward is a challenge. Taking care of my health, my vitality, and my heart isn't as easy as it was at twenty… it can be a job in itself. Health, mobility, energy, and time are my focus now. That, and PAINTING!

I've taken a deep dive into my work: what matters to me, what I want to say, techniques, and all things production. But the biggest question has become: what is my intuition telling me? What tickles my belly when I look at it… what brings me to tears? What makes a painting alive? 'm practicing not going all the way to 100% finished, but stopping at 85%, leaving room on the canvas for the energy that is creation and life. We shall see if I can do that and not fiddle it to death.

People have always called me overly sensitive, and I've grown more and more sensitive over the years. I t got even stronger this year, but it's been building since COVID, and since CANCER. For those of you who don't know about my journey with that, I'll write about it sometime. In a nutshell, I was diagnosed with cancers number three and four in May of 2024, and I'm now cancer-free again and getting stronger every day. It has changed my life, though. I know realistically that I won't survive life any more than any of us will, but for me it's been right in my face for a while now. I'm not going to spend any time ruminating. I'm focusing on doing, living, and being totally MYSELF.

So what about the goosebumps, you might ask? The other night I was watching contestants on America's Got Talent on YouTube, and I can tell you I know exactly who will win. My body tells me. Goosebumps come up and won't stop, running from head to toe until the person finishes. And I'm always right. There are degrees of goosebumps, too. The no-shadow-of-a-doubt ones run head to toe and back again, over and over. It happens when I read something, watch something, or hear something. I know TRUTH, even when it's hidden. This is something I've always experienced, but now… it's off the rails!

The same goes for my work. I'll tell you, I lack patience, always have. I won't bake cookies because I hate repetitive, boring work. So I have to practice patience, listening, and sitting with a painting until I reach the point where I KNOW. And it maddens me when what I know is that I have to keep going, that it isn't finished yet.

I don't get those goosebumps for my own work yet. I've always thought of them as my truth meter, but it only seems to work for other people's. My latest large painting has brought me the closest. When I was sick, lying on the sofa in front of it, I saw figures, faces, people, and they kept coming. But over time the painting got muddy, I lost the light, and the figures became too rendered… too real. It had gotten tedious, and you know how I feel about tedious. So I painted over the whole thing, and more figures popped up anyway. That was over the top And here's what I figured out: my impatience might be a truth meter too. When a painting gets tedious, it's usually because I've stopped listening and started controlling. I'm illustrating the figures instead of letting them arrive. Goosebumps tell me when something is true. Boredom tells me when I've stopped listening.

*Now: work in progress, 10' x 7', October 2026. Still not finished… but the figures keep showing up. How many can you find?*

That painting helped me find words for what I've been doing all along. I recently wrote a new four-sentence artist statement:

I paint the negative space of the world: the shadow instead of the tree, the reflection in the puddle, the figure that arrives before I know who invited it. I keep asking what lives beneath the surface of a life, the grief and the awe and the scent of jasmine on the air, arriving whether or not we are ready. I build each painting in layers of acrylic and mixed media, beginning in raw color and finishing in oil, covering and covering until the history I can't see becomes the structure holding the light. I want you to feel the quiet undercurrent of your own life, and to be a little devastated by how alive it is.

So that sums up my year, simply: a year of impatience, a year of goosebumps, and a year of joy doing the work I love. I hope you'll stay on the ride with me for another year, and God willing, I'll be here to write this again in October 2027… and maybe I'll be telling you about the first painting of my own that gave me goosebumps.

Querencia