Painting again (more)

You know that this sewing stuff I make and show to you here is all relatively new for me. It comes from a deep and abiding joy. It is a new project–a new brand. But it isn't the whole me. I will sometimes share a tiny bit of my other work. It might not appeal to you and that is OK. We are each our own morass of impulses, urges, and complexities. They don't all overlap. But they define us.

I am an abstract painter and have been making large, abstract work since I was twelve. 28 years later, I still am. I took a little break. But here I am again. I am finding myself and picking up the threads.

Here is today:
 

Uttanasana III (in process)– 30" x 44" – February 2013 (Ink and acrylic on paper)

When I paint, I become clear to myself. Clear as in transparent.

Clear as in see-through...as in dissolved. As in a sheet of thin plastic.

I become clear. And I can see things that I spend so very much time not-seeing. And when I paint, it is as if, standing in front of my work, with brush in hand­, all of the sudden I am clear. And there it all is. And, it isn’t about the marks I make. It is about the life I have lived.

And things show up. And, all of the sudden, I am aware that I had to hold, no, pin-down–my baby boy, while the nurses fished for his port, fished through the skin on the left side of his chest, with a little needle that looked like a tack attached to a tube–through which would drip Vinblastine. Chemotherapy. Dripping into my two- year old boy. His precious body.

And the port would sometimes clog and close and clot. And the chemo couldn’t get in. And they had to put magical medical Drano into his port­ to unclog it. And we would have to wait to see if that stuff would work. “And if it doesn’t work?” I would ask. If it doesn’t work, we may have to put in a new port. That happens. 

But it always worked. The port Drano. And an extra hour later, after the social-worker cheer-leaders had exhausted all sources of Lightning McQueen, flashing lights, and toys, they would begin to drip in the chemo.

And we did that all year. Every month. And it healed my baby boy. Five years have passed since then and my baby is now an older boy–shining and healthy and loving and strong and kind. And, I am more grateful than words can even say. But here it is today, right in front of me, and I am reduced to sobs at the thought of what we did–what so many others have done and are still doing.

And all of that is clear as I paint. And I can’t not-see it. And that is why I have to paint, because the truth is right there if I reach out and grab it, if I not-block it. If I not-hide from it. If I not-run. If I reach out my brush and touch it, ever so lightly. I don’t need to hold onto it, just let it wash over. And let it go. Because seeing is why we are here.

-Carrie Bloomston 
 February 15, 2013