The Wayfaring Wordhack

(posted 26 Feb)

For anyone keeping count, you will know that I didn't post our 4th prompt.  We all did it, but none of us felt very inspired to share it.  That happens.  This past week, our prompts were Etel Adnan (a Lebanese American artist, poet, essayist) and China.  None of my family felt very motivated by this one, either. LOL

I had a most amazing thing--a bright and happy thing--happen to me, and I think the world needs more trumpeting of news of that sort.  

My art course just wrapped up, and there is a paying community alumni can access once it is over.  I decided because of the financial and time burden, I would not be continuing.  I said my goodbyes and expressed my appreciation for the course and my fellow students...and woke up to a message from one of the other students saying she would like to offer me access to the community for a year.  She said she appreciated my contributions so much over the courses, all the time and effort that I put into helping others, that she didn't want to see my time with them end.  I was very touched but felt I couldn't accept. Yes, the money is one issue, but the time-involvement "required"* is even more of a hang up for me.

Before I could graciously formulate my refusal, she went ahead and paid it, telling me that she did not expect me to be there all the time, no obligations.

I was so honored and touched by her gesture and the outpouring of love when the others knew I would be continuing.

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*There are no requirements, but I am not a half-measures person when I commit to something and I put a lot of time into something I am dedicated to seeing through.

 (Kifkon = Levantine Arabic for how are [plural] you doing?)

I am fine but in an odd limbo-mode with the return to Lebanon.  The mode isn't necessarily bad, just business as usual* with a helping of sliding back into a home after three months' absence.  I don't really recall this sensation upon my returns to Egypt after extended stays in France, but I think the difference boils down to the fact that in those other stays, I was not at my own home.  As much as I appreciate many things about my mother-in-law,** living with her for months at a time was seriously draining in a way that made it a relief to get back to Egypt and my own place, however hot, polluted, and noisy it was.

In addition to having my Color course at the end of this month, I have an overwhelming desire for a bit more structure and repartition of my creative forces.  Make that my "forces" tout court.

I haven't written in so long, and I want to be writing.  I find this talk pretty motivational:


I took the art courses to get better at illustration (knowing the courses are NOT geared to that, but any skills are good skills and many things translate between fine art and illustration), but I haven't worked at all on my picture books.

I was pretty single-minded with the course, and I feel like I wasn't present enough with the kids. That needs to change and I need to do better during the next module.

I want to get in better shape. There is nothing good about the shape I am in now.  I am not genetically predisposed to thinness, nor do I have what would be considered a good metabolism, suffering instead from hormonal imbalances that make attaining/maintaining a healthy weight more difficult.   Aside from being in my late forties now, I have been dealing with a two-year-long bout of tendinitis in my left shoulder (and I am a lefty), which was preceded with a knee-injury that also came and went with varying degrees of fierceness for a two year period (and I still get flare-ups when something else is out of whack).  All that to say, I've found it too painful for too long to be active.  And any claim to good muscle mass I once had disappeared in a scarily fast way as a result of my inability to function normally in my body.  I am fed up with it, though---and a bit scared that it is getting too late--and want to do something about it, even if it is just simple stretches every morning.  I may not be a waif, but I am (or was) a lot more flexible than many waifs I know, and even my flexibility is going, making me feel so old and stove up all the time.  So baby steps, but STEPS instead of just "waiting for the pain to pass."

I am at the "I have to get started making changes" stage but don't want to shoot myself in the foot or take on more than I can handle.  I am considering how all of these desires can be addressed with a "one degree of change" mentality.  I heard someone giving an analogy about how trying to affect permanent change à la New Year's Resolutions is synonymous to stretching out a rubber band. It does change, but when you release the unsustainable force of keeping it stretched, it returns to its normal shape.  I don't want to be the rubber band; there are only so many of those stretches and rebounds one can do before cracks start appearing in the rubber and the inevitable happens. By stretching the band just a bit at a time, you can more easily coax it into a new shape.  There are problems with the analogy but the point resonates with me.

We are probably going to take a short trip for my birthday, which means that any schedule I get going will temporarily be set aside again. But that is precisely the kind of thing I need to learn to deal with.  I ALWAYS get thrown off track by something not being the way it usually is, but as I have said before, we have constant disrupts to our everyday normal with J's work and our educational choices.

What works for you in trying to form new habits or keep habits going in the face of uncertainty and frequent change?  Do you track things, use daily lists, time slots, project files ...?  Ugh, my brain is still a bit jet-lagged; I can't think of proper terms.  Just tell me whatcha got, if you've got anything. :P

Enough about how I am.   How are you, and what are you up to?

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* You know, trying to judge when we actually have city water by listening for a pump to come on and praying we can get enough water into our tank not to have to pay a private company to come and fill it for us; not being able to drink from the faucets, dealing with cockroaches everywhere, neighbors afflicted with hearing loss, drivers who think everyone in the village needs to hear how loud their hotrods can be...  On the power front, things are better; e have constant electricity "switches" or micro-cuts (from generator to gov't elec) but so far only one 30 minute cut.

** An unfortunate incident happened in the extended family at the beginning of summer that doesn't involve me, husband, or kids (thankfully) that really brought home to me the depth of difference between me and my mother-in-law.  I already knew much about our differences, but oh my, her brain and analysis of situations and the way to proceed, does not AT ALL align with my own.  I like to think I am the one living in the margins of normal.

 I cannot believe I have not posted since the end of April.  I keep meaning to make a post. I keep thinking, "Oh, I can this..." and I just don't do it.

Well, at least in my case, no is harmed by my not following through. ;)

What we have been up to in a very small nutshell:

We've been back in France for over a month now.  Can't say that too loud because the kids are NOT ready to go back to Lebanon and they don't want to talk about the return creeping up on us.  J, however, has been back in Lebanon for 3 weeks now, and of course we miss him.  But, we are loving being home.

I have been doing art.  Finished the first painting module and am studiously practicing all I learned while waiting for the second painting course to start in September.

We have had the misfortune of momma bats thinking our house is a good place to have babies.  I say misfortune because with windows getting shut resulting in mommas and babies getting separated, bats getting trapped in the sink, etc. we have found several babies dead. :( I have an infant bat graveyard in a large flowerpot by my door.

I currently have three juveniles--too small to take care of themselves--in a box on my kitchen table. :(

In happier news, though we can't expect anything from an annual garden, we had a glut of strawberries, then raspberries, and this is the first year that our currant bushes and gooseberries have produced well.  If the weather doesn't get crazy we will have a lot of peaches, too.  And it turns out that two of the trees we have grown from seed are nectarines.  Each tree only has one fruit, but hey, we are happy to know what they are.  It is not a good year for apples though.  The grapes are going to produce a bumper crop, though, but we might miss those too since they usually ripen in September.  Maybe next year we will come a little later in the summer and stay longer...

Here is a painting of the Gavarnie in the French Pyrenées that I did.  I am making progress.

 As you may (or not) remember, I was doing a drawing class online.  It began back in January and the final segment--a 30-day drawing challenge--just ended a few days ago.  It was a lot of fun but very time-consuming.  I drew a lot, met a lot of nice people, and decided to take the next two modules from this teacher, one about confident brushwork and the other about color.

Although you can't see much detail, I will post a snapshot of the my 30-day-challenge drawings to give you an idea of what I have been up to.




Sorry for the fuzziness of the top images; I took the photo with my phone while standing on a chair.  The keen of eye will notice that there are three duplicates.  The bridge and Sprout in a towel were drawn in both the "normal" way with pencil strokes going any which way, and the other two I set myself the challenge of doing the drawing with only vertical pencil marks.  The two water buffalo sketches was me testing two different types of paper.

While the kind of sketching I did in the class is a far cry from the illustration work I want to do, I know that the firm foundation and skills I am building will stand me in good stead no matter what kind of artistic undertaking I pursue.

Seeing as it has been a year since our arrival and I--unlike my family--do not have French* citizenship, I had to go downtown to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to get my Iqama (visa card) renewed.  Thankfully, it was a pretty straightforward process.

The whole family came along (but they waited in the car), so we went to the National Museum of Beirut afterwards.  My phone is charging now, and I am too lazy and cold to stand by it and send myself files, which means a photo post will come later. If at all. :P

We then went out to eat and ran into several of J's colleagues since the restaurant we chose was right across the street from his work as well as being next to the museum.  Makes Beirut feel like a very small place.

And now I am happy to be back home.  I wanted to go to the art store and do some groceries, but the above activities were quite enough for one day.  But that only means I will have to go back to town again soon.  Tomorrow, H and I have an art date.  I suggested we stay at my place.  The weather is incredibly mild,** and we can sit in the garden and do art and chat while watching sunbirds dart amongst the hibiscus.  Sounds like a plan!

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* Their cards have a 2-year validity

** As I tried to tell the clerk who took care of my application at the ministry, this time last year, I was frantically crocheting myself my fingerless mittens because it was so cold.  I say "trying" not because of the language barrier, but because she could not have cared less. :P

From our living room window, I spied these beautiful storm clouds building.  I snapped a photo from inside and then thought it would be better to enjoy the show from the rooftop.




I need a tripod to really get some settings that do the scenery justice: 


But I loved every minute of trying to capture the light and forms. :)



All the accompanying rain fell far from me, most of it out to sea, so your friendly photographer was not dampened by the experience.  Indeed it was good to get out of the flat and breathe some fresh air.