Big shift

I’ve been wanting to write – I said I would, I fully intended to – but haven’t been able to focus. Maybe it’s because, let’s face it, all I’ve ever written about is my own story. Self-absorbed? Maybe, but it’s all I’ve had to share, all I really know. Sam-son is a good story too – an extraordinary narrative to share. The years since he died have continued to be a bumpy journey, as those who’ve followed Gone Upstairs or my failed attempt at putting it into a book (too soon!) on Write on Sally will know.

This Heart Space blog has been yet another iteration of my attempts to let creativity lead me out of grief – using the old model of reflection, self-examination, expression, sharing the ups and downs, trying to gee myself up and take others with me. On here I was aiming to gather the different strands back together and post my poems (post-Ray & Redhead), photos (in addition to A Lover of the Light) and paintings, alongside the prose posts. They’re all coming from the same inner source.

I get into a flow and then something happens to interrupt it and I dry up, feel too vulnerable, go away, get too tired… Then every so often, around the time of a birthday or particular anniversary, I’ll take a big breath and try again. But even as I’ve done that again recently it feels more as if the story has completely stalled and I’ve been stuck in a hole going round and round in circles trying to find the way out. Or not. There are only so many times one can describe depression, expound the journey of loss, tell the same apposite stories, before one gets sick of the sound of it – and that’s the writer, let alone the reader!

I am a child again – back to the beginning before all the pain. Who was I then? What was inside me that got squashed and couldn’t get out? The weight of expectation put on me (“you have to do sciences, anyone can do arts”) made me dumb and numb to my own desires, the lack of nurture and affection turned me inward and silent. I just got on with life, finding out for myself how to go through the motions, behave appropriately, tick the boxes.

I was a self-taught nice person, good Christian girl – until the inevitable explosion. But that is another story... Jesus has been nothing but kind through it all. I have been fully and utterly redeemed since then, led on the vitally important inner journey and over the past 13 years in particular all the layers have been peeled away leading right back to the original plan: to find out my heart’s desire, what was I made for?

So I have been having a second childhood in my 7th decade! I’ve explored writing, poetry, classical music, spirituality, pottery and painting, through classes, concerts and retreats. These are the things that fill most ‘retired’ people’s time – ‘hobbies’. Not forgetting genteel sports like badminton, bowls, aqua-robics, U3A and volunteering, and travelling of course – all the 3rd generation pastimes, especially useful if the ‘older’ person doesn’t have a career or grandchildren, like me. We all long for purpose and I’ve been blogging my way through, trying to discern and share the trajectory.

But now I can’t find the right words, the write words. I am beyond – no before – words. My heart language is a ‘felt’ gibberish, speaking in tongues under my breath. My vocabulary is a bare cupboard, writing is a blank page – there is no flow. I am prehistoric humanity, a lake of tears, a desert wanderer.

Last week I signed up for an online painting course called Find Your Joy – appropriate after my last post, Follow Your Joy. Well we can only follow something when we’ve found it! What else does a child do? What they love, what they enjoy! We all know that inner prompt – the excitement, the anticipation. For me it’s the coming 60th anniversary of Doctor Who with DT as the 14th doctor!! To have anything at all that sparks that feeling when one is depressed is a kind of miracle.

The course was good – 8 days of painting exercises and feedback, loads of encouragement. This woman could be my joy mentor – it was more about finding out what’s within and letting it out, letting paint express the inner me, than about technique or tools. It promoted the freedom and confidence to be a unique creative voice; it dovetailed perfectly with my spiritual journey to find my heart’s desire. I loved the clear call to grow in joy and learn how to express that on canvas or paper – to become fulfilled and happy.

Back in 2014 a faithful prophetic friend who had been my helper all though our 2013 journey to Haiti – yet another story! – as a final farewell act when Sam died gave me a box of oil pastels saying, “I feel you’re going to use these”. Art was literally nowhere on my radar – I didn’t believe her at all! But months later we’d moved to Leicester and a retired colleague of Martin’s took me to my first watercolour class. That was the first chink of light that started me exploring colour and paint. So a BIG thank you, Sîan – and thank you, Gill! ‘My first flowers’ even made it into the Yellow Book for mental wellness produced by the Rethink your Mind charity with the University of Leicester the following year:

Our daughter Rebecca, who has been a brilliant cartoonist and illustrator for many years and taught art communication to autistic kids, one day surprised us by saying “I am a musician”. And they are, with an album, Little Victories and sizeable gig following in Brighton to prove it! Now I, who has said – mostly to myself – a number of times “I am a writer” am going to focus on this late-to-the-party outlet, give myself a chance, work hard at it and even dare to say, as my courage grows: Surprise! I am an artist!