Goodbyes

Breaking patterns and making space for something new

Taken this morning, at my last yoga class in this space. Wall art by Marlene Koenig: https://www.marlenekoenigart.com/artwork

This monthly missive is a way for me to make connections with people interested in art and creativity in order to inspire a more satisfying and thoughtful daily life. I'm an author and editor, always on the lookout for inspiration.

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The rain has been falling steadily in Key West for three days now; it’s like living in a steam bath. We are in the tropics. My hair is huge and my spirit is buoyant.

I’m always wistful when it’s time to say goodbye to a space that has been special to me. This morning in yoga, I stared at Marlene Koenig’s Ganesh painting on the wall in front of me and thought: when I come back to Key West, this studio will have moved. I’ll never set foot in this space again.

It’s where I launched This Terrible Beauty. Over the past seven years I’ve spent many hours staring at the flowers on the walls, enjoying the sound of Tara’s gongs, sinking into in a dream state during savasana which befriends and encourages my imagination.

For almost five years I rented office space in Dedham, where I wrote, co-authored and ghosted many books. When I closed it up, I stood there staring at the empty space — gone were the hundreds of books and papers and paintings — and I thought, weird. I’ll never set foot in this space again.

When I travel to a destination like Tulum in Mexico where I’ve had the privilege of enjoying its natural beauty but I know I’m not returning (because the bounty of the world is too great for me not to explore other cool places), I think: I will never set foot on these shores again and yet this place will continue to exist.

“Never again” makes space for something new

I don’t think of each passing year as running from New Year to New Year in a 12 month cycle.

For me there is “the year” which runs from October to May, and then there is “the summer,” which is June to September. Basically, I still think of the cycle of years in the same way I did when I was a student operating according to the academic calendar.

This gives me the sense of freedom. Summers represent a departure from the norm, a new routine — and with new routines come new goals.

This past season in Key West did not go as expected. Incredible successes pushed up hard against the warty toad of failure, or silence, or (if I’m being generous) unwanted pauses.

One of my goals this year has been to be more patient with these unexpected and unwelcome pauses. Are they forever or are they temporary? How much control do I have over them? Can I learn to cede control and be okay with not trying to change things?

A different kind of creativity

This summer, I’m choosing to pause.

I’ll break the pattern of coming to an office each day, sitting at a computer and expecting myself to produce something valuable. Making the choice to do that feels fantastic.

My plan this summer is to create beautiful spaces.

Not imaginary spaces, but real ones. I’m going to paint walls and ceilings. I will learn to hang a mural. I will gild walls in gold foil. For the first time in my life, I will use stencils: my plan is to produce 35 huge, identical patterns to create ceiling panels. I’m really excited about getting my hands dirty and learning new things.

When the spirit moves me, I will chronicle these creative activities in Anatomy of a Novel. It’s not writing, but it’s making something lasting and worthwhile, and I’m hoping that will help me feel purposeful and content.

I’m going to allow this magical spot in the Catskills — which has taken root in my imagination and won’t let go — to slowly reveal its many surprises to me. A Japanese professor from Yokohama will visit us; he’s writing about Jokichi Takamine, the first owner of Sho Fu Den (the house we’re restoring). Soon I’ll be getting high res images of the paintings that used to hang on its walls so I can figure out whether recreating them is feasible. And I’ll be hosting friends on the newly rebuilt front porch, watching the sun set over a rolling (though unkempt) lawn that used to be covered in 100-foot pines.

Saying goodbye to those woods was, by the way, a really, really tough goodbye. A savage storm blew down almost all of those 100-foot pines — you can’t imagine the devastation. We cried for years.

I’ll never set foot in those woods again.

But now, in place of the woods is a vista and at the far end of that vista is a sunset. Saying goodbye to one thing led us to a wholly unexpected miracle.

A few remaining big pines in the distance.