emancipation day

it's appropriate that i was awakened this morning by an earthquake that was 4.7 on the richter scale, centered across the sound in southern sweden. as strange as it sounds (and no offense to my dear san franciscan, who i realize faces true danger from earthquakes on a daily basis) but i really like earthquakes. that shifting of the earth, shaking me out of slumber and making me feel immediately alert is somehow delicious and life-affirming for me. and no one was hurt. so in more than one way today feels like a day of celebration....

i survived an early morning earthquake and it's been one year since i realized that i couldn't work for someone who looked like uncle fester but behaved with less manners and compassion. someone who would make decisions--harsh, life-changing decisions--without knowing the whole story and then not be man enough to be able to say he'd made a mistake. this despicable person actually fired several hundred people without looking into whether there would be a union issue--made a big proud announcement of the act to the newspapers about the fantastic (and fictional) sums he was going to save and then, when it had to be retracted because it was a HUGE union issue with major repercussions, didn't bother to even send a press release about the reversed decision. i knew i couldn't continue to get up in the morning and look myself in the eye as i brushed my teeth if i continued to work for this man. so i decided not to on this day one year ago.

it has proven to be one of the best decisions i've ever made. i had a conversation with someone last week who said i looked five years younger (at my age, that's pretty significant!) and i can see that my life is immeasurably better. there were great things about the job that i had, but four bosses in three and a half years was exhausting, especially as each one came in and decided that anything the last guy had approved was automatically bad. there was no continuity and no one with an over-all big picture view. each guy waltzed in and wanted to make his mark and then walk out again on to the next job within the company. looking back, it was mind-numbing, the constant battle state one was in. and my mind was numb.  it took me nearly this entire year to be well and truly over it.

i have been so fortunate to have the opportunity to have a job that perfectly enabled me to get over it and i'll always be grateful for that...some amazing planetary alignment clicked into place and i found exactly the situation i needed. to be mostly at home and there to pick up sabin so she didn't have to spend such long days at school and her after school program. to work with people who it felt good and comfortable to be around. to travel enough to stay gold (i know, i'm shallow, but this is strangely important to me) and to get the outside input i needed. it's been a marvelous year.

we should really be more grateful to the monsters we come across in our lives, because they do have a way of making us look in another direction, one that we might not have otherwise seen. so in a way, i'm grateful to uncle fester for being such a monumental ass, because it forced me to see the situation i was in for what it was. and it wasn't good. i was run down, i had seemingly forgotten how to sleep, i didn't do anything creative, my laughter had become forced and i didn't have enough time for the things that are important in my life--in fact, i had sort of forgotten what those things were in the haze i was stumbling through. it was no way to live. and now, one year later, thankfully i don't live that way anymore.

now i'm able to separate the great experiences i had in that job--seeing parts of the world i'd never seen, some of the truly wonderful people i worked with and who are still in my life, the network i built, the things i built up which couldn't be undone by uncle fester--e.g. my reputation, the time i spent with smart, creative people who furthered my thinking and helped me push borders. i can look back on all of that fondly now. and be grateful for those people and those experiences.

sometimes the earth moves under our feet and our world subtly shifts, we are shaken into awareness and find our way back to ourselves. that feels worth celebrating.

constricted freedom

i learned a number of lessons at the painting course:

1. it's impossible to immediately make the leap from denmark's most uptight environment to a painting studio on a collective. one will inevitably retain some of the uptightness.
2. the sort of concentration i've been doing over the past, at least 3 years, is a very different kind of concentration than one needs to paint.
3. a painting studio is not an outlook-run environment. this is a good thing, but it takes getting used to.
4. you cannot tell anything about anyone just by looking at them.
5. i must wear clothes that promote a sense of freedom.
6. the hazy ideas in my head are difficult to wrestle to the canvas.
7. the music that's playing while you paint is important.
8. need bigger canvases.

the other students were quite a collection of characters:

1. an older man, very quiet, very contained and a totally awesome painter.
2. a crazy, middle-aged chubby lady, also an awesome painter, but painting with her hands, very boldly and with awesome colors. paint all over her shirt and pants, hair all up rather crazily. clearly able to hear the music of the paint and move it around the canvas with a deliberation and freedom that i envy.
3. three old ladies who are clearly old friends, all 3 new to painting, but each very good in their own way.
4. a lovely woman from the faroe islands who is painstakingly painting the cliffs of the faroe islands in hues of purple and grey.
5. a 50-ish woman with an expensive haircut, painting with acrylics and a scraper on metal.

the teacher is, of course, a painter himself. dutch. been in denmark for 20 years. a charming character. very much a spirit of '68 type, with freedom to do whatever, there are no rules. he played pink floyd. that was cool.

next time, i will dress in clothes that can get paint on them and take a larger canvas. i will open up. of this i am sure. it will just take time.