The Dust of Everyday Life

Pablo Picasso said, “Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life.”

I have needed some dust washed off my soul lately.

In the wake of Jonathan's death, I have found myself reflecting on thoughts too numerous to mention all in one place, but finding at the same time a sense of desperation to get them out of my head and onto paper or onto canvas.  Because in the days after his loss, I just kept coming back to the same phrase over and over again:

There is healing in the act of creation.

There is a solace that is found in making something that is all together separate from you, but still a part of you.  Maybe it's my way of remembering.  My way of honoring.  My way of healing.  Because I don't know what else to do.  I don't know what else to do other than write.  Journal entries.  Blog entries.  Cards to people, talking about Jonathan.  I don't know what else to do other than to paint, to put a brush in my hands and figure out a way to bring life to my own soul.  That's what I know to do.

I remember after I lost my grandfather several years ago, I dredged up a story I had written about him when I was an undergrad student.  It was originally a creative writing assignment for an American Lit class I was taking.  We were to write a story with "local color," a story that conveyed a distinct region or area, including dialect and geography.  I chose my grandparents' farm and the words of my grandfather to tell the story I had bottled up in my head.  So, when he died, I did a painting based on that story, a story I dearly love because, from my perspective, it so clearly captured my grandfather and all that I esteemed him to be.  I treasure that painting and that story so.

Because that's what I have to do to wash the dust off my soul.  Because that's where I find some semblance of healing and satisfaction in the face of loss.

There is healing in the act of creation.

"God created the heavens and the earth...and he saw that it was good..."