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| Bullishly Blue - International art connections - see below |
2016: Since I started working with the Gratitude Miracles journal, I’ve become more aware of ordinary miracles. I note them in the journal and every week a few turn up. Most of them have indeed been ordinary even though unexpected and delightful … a visit with a friend, a new idea or opportunity, a kind comment.
None of them have been more ordinary than the chair I bought earlier this week at the Salvation Army Thrift Store. My last move left me without a comfy chair. I thought I could make do with the couch. I thought that for a year and a half before deciding I truly needed a good chair, a recliner. It had a few constraints: cloth not leather, small enough for me to lift it, plain color - blue or wine, and in reasonably good condition.
I’ve been checking Craigslist and local thrift stores, becoming more and more discouraged, to the point where I wondered if I would have to buy something new. So, it was a surprise when I found the almost perfect chair, at a thrift store that I almost never go to, and also on sale. I didn’t even count this chair as a miracle. It was just something I wanted and finally found.
The miracle happened when I moved the furniture around in the living room to make way for the new chair. Something happened. It’s like the room woke up and said, “Ta da!”
Don’t get me wrong. This is not a designer living room. It’s a motley assortment of mis-matched items from various thrift stores since I sold all my furniture before my last move. But, when all the pieces were back in place, … I don’t know how else to say it … it turned into sacred space. It made my heart sing. It made me think of the space and all the surfaces in it as altars … altars to spirit, to creativity, to life.
Several years ago, I saw the movie, Words and Pictures, about two high school teachers: one art, one English. The art teacher suffers from rheumatoid arthritis and lives in her studio. The movie is good, but I was captivated by the idea of living in an art studio. Of course, my art is digital so it wouldn’t have all the wonderful paints and brushes and canvases and so on that make a painter’s studio so wonderful. My art studio would look more like living in an iMac.
Now, however, I feel like I am living in a studio. It is alive with art and color and books and the projects I’m working on. I’ve spent the last couple of days cleaning and rearranging, honoring the space as sacred, honoring the miracle of creativity and life, honoring the dance of gratitude and miracles.
International Art Connection: Somewhere in San Miguel de Allende, there is a wall artist who painted this picture ... the bull, not the cars
I think we must be kindred spirits. This bull spoke to me, invited me to play. Today, sitting in my new space, my new studio, we did, indeed, play.
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