Earth Day 2019

 Mother Earth, this day

may all that dwell upon you

 

 

venerate your name. 

~delayne.

Good Question

Last week I stayed with my parents at their house Up North, and at the end of my visit my dad drove me home again. Too late I realized that we'd passed the turn-off to the Rum River Art Center and my little studio, and I said so aloud, adding, "If I'd thought about it sooner, I would've had us go there so I could show it to you." I knew he was in a hurry, so I didn't expect him to turn around and really go there! But it was an enormous pleasure for me to unlock the door to the Art Center and invite him in, the guy whose opinion matters more to me than I can begin to express.

I showed him the large classroom space as we approached my studio door, and I heard him chuckle when he saw my busy window full of my drawings and comics and doodles. And he chuckled again when I opened the door and turned on my light. "So this is it! Well, you sure have a lot of stuff...." I do. And I expected a comment like that. My little room is cluttered with art supplies, show materials, product displays, and art on the walls that I find comforting and inspirational. It's somewhat of an 'organized' mess....

Inside the door on a little table were some leaflings that I'd recently created, spread out on craft paper and awaiting more of my attention. Dad said, "So you work on your leaves here...." And then after a pause he said, "Do people really buy these?"

I get that question a lot, usually from well-meaning family members (and my tax guy, who I suspect is surprised that anyone buys anything from me at all). The first time I heard it I was a bit offended, but now I understand.

With his question, Dad was trying to wrap his head around why someone would buy a leafling because THEN what do they do with it? I've been asking myself this question ever since the first customer picked one up and asked me how much it was. But I've since gotten lots of answers. And I would've shared them with Dad that day if I thought there was time. So instead I just laughed and said, "They do. And no one's more surprised by that than I am."

I've had people purchase leaflings for all sorts of reasons. Many have gone on to frame one or display it in a shadowbox or tuck it behind a picture on the wall. A friend of a friend bought five and hand-carried them to Glastonbury Tor as gifts for the other attendees at a spiritual get-together. Three siblings who lost a nature-loving sister to cancer bought one to leave at her gravesite. A young woman toted one on a hike to the Grand Canyon and then made a wish before sending it over the edge. Another left her purchased leafling on the Gun Flint Trail in memory of her father, who enjoyed hiking it. And these are just a few of the stories I've collected over the short period of time that I've offered these creations....

I wonder just how satisfying these explanations are, really, to anyone but myself. Do they really address my dad's query?

People who follow me online respond to my leafling images in a way that both pleases me and surprises me. And when they hold one in person, the reaction it gets is too heartwarming for words. What IS it about them?? I have no idea....

But I'm just the messenger, the middleman, the conduit. What do I know?

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It's a Whole New Year!

Happy New Year, my friend! I hope great things for you in 2018.

How was your holiday season? It was a rollercoaster for me, as always, what with some traveling and last minute art sales. The seasonal flu hit my little circle hard (not me personally, thankfully), and this year's strain is the pits. My holiday gatherings were minus a number of dear faces as family members hunkered down to recover. I used to be rather ambivalent about getting a flu shot until the season I went down hard with it, thinking it was just a bad cold at the time. And in the midst of a serious fever I can recall being fearful for my life, and I never want to experience that kind of a 'cold' again. I know flu season hasn't peaked yet. If you experience it at all, I hope its visit is brief and gentle.

Tax Season has arrived here. (Ick...) But because I did some additional art shows in 2017 and vowed at each one to let customers Pay What They Wish, my annual sales were up for a change, and I never get an opportunity to show my Tax Guy that I can make more than 50-cents a year. (I hope he's proud of me. I'm proud of me.) Because my year-long experiment was interesting and fortunately worked out in my favor, I want to try it again for another year -- just to see if the surprising results I experienced were just a fluke. Fingers crossed! I would LOVE to make this Pay What You Wish platform a forever thing.

As I write this post, I'm busy gearing up for the North Artists Studio Crawl (Studio G on the map again!; last year's experience was wonder-filled) and the St. Paul Art Crawl (Carleton Lofts location). And I'm creating Leaflings as fast as I can. Sharing them this past year with the public has warmed my heart and given me hope for the future.

So there! A bit of news to begin this year's blogging. I look forward to keeping you updated! And I hope that 2018 is grand for us all.
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Leafpower

It's been one of those weeks.

You'd think it was due to the rapid approach of Fest, but MNRF is the furthest thing from my mind lately....

No, there's been other stuff, hospitals and health-related stuff (not for me, for someone I love), and some crazy shenanigans in the White House, and things that have raised my blood pressure and made me question whether or not I went to sleep one night and woke up in a Stephen King novel. The kind where otherwise intelligent and empathetic people suddenly go off the rails and begin wreaking havoc for no apparent reason. Nothing makes sense! It was REALLY not making sense about this time a year ago, but this is off the charts now....

Anyway....

After a couple days of back-and-forth hospital visits spent in a car full of memories, remembering the past and wondering about the future, studying the physical effects of the passage of Time, and being waaaaay far away in my head, I finally got myself in to the Studio. I opened the door there and saw leaves EVERYwhere -- some awaiting their frames, some spread out on my little table, some raked into a pile on the floor, some in various stages of completion, others sticking out of books and bags and boxes, others decorating the walls. Their mess was everywhere. Their scent was glorious.

Dr. Leo Buscaglia

Walking into the room reminded me of an anecdote once shared on PBS by the late Dr. Leo Buscaglia. He told his audience then of his great love of leaves and how one Autumn friends of his raked up a whole yardful, carried them into his house, and dumped the lot onto his livingroom rug. (The camera was focused on some older ladies in the audience when he said this, and the looks of alarm on their faces was priceless. I was reminded of my mother. In fact, when I recall this particular program now, I sense her in the background behind me, aghast, just like those women. But then he went on to say that all winter long, he and his friends hung out in that livingroom, sitting in piles of leaves. Everyone laughed. The audience ladies giggled uncomfortably, perhaps imagining all the eventual compost. I'll never forget the anecdote, and I can recall that feeling of recognizing a kindred spirit out there in Television Land....)

He loved leaves, too.

After hanging up my backpack and sitting down to work, I found that I didn't know how to begin, where to start. Should I clean the room? Would that make me feel better? Make a list? (Lists always soothe me....) Turn on Public Radio and let Capitol Hill wind me up some more? A class of kids was noisily and animatedly creating art outside my door, so there was no chance to stroll around the classroom and get my bearings. I didn't even feel comfortable using the microwave out there for my tea, in case I disturbed them.

Then I remembered headphones. And the audio book I'd bought at a sale -- 'The Dark is Rising' by Susan Cooper (read it years ago and loved it). And soon I was caught up in the tale, and before I knew it there were gilded leaves in front of me, old and crisp things that were suddenly beyond beautiful. Even the imperfect and overlooked ones were now soothing my soul.

Things weren't perfect by the time I left for the day, but they were definitely better. And I'll take that! I'll take that and run with it.
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And the Envelope Goes to....

Me and my Avery rocked the Crawl. (Thanks for your help, Avery!)

In my last post I wrote about my preparations for the North Artists Studio Crawl. And in this post I'll tell you how it went. (Spoiler: it was magickal.)

As prepared as I was for it, I got very little sleep the night before, as until nearly 5 a.m. the morning of the Crawl my head was a big old mess.

I'd decided earlier that day to try something unusual, something I first tried at Fest last season wherein I let people take Leaflings home with them for an exchange of whatever they personally thought was fair. Because I didn't want them to feel judged for their donation, I offered them a plain envelope at the time of the exchange and asked that they put in it whatever they wished and I wouldn't open the envelope until after the weekend. Also, I assured them that I wouldn't know which envelope they were responsible for because all the envelopes look the same and would get mixed together in my take-home bag so I wouldn't know whose was whose....

As you can imagine, the Fest 'experiment' was eye-opening. The Leaflings folks could choose from at that time weren't framed or anything; they were loose leaves that I'd individually embellished and carefully protected with a sealant. Each weekend after Fest I'd go home with about a dozen envelopes, and James would open them for me, mostly because of my rule to not personally take money for magick, but also because I was afraid to be disappointed.

Many of the envelopes contained single dollar bills. And many contained much more. As promised, I didn't know who was responsible for which particular envelope, except for the time a well-dressed woman chose four Leaflings and paid me in pocket change, and I only know that because I could hear it jingle as the coins were dropped in the envelope. At least two others refused to follow my rules and instead forced me to take their money (which happened to be a significant amount). And the only reason I could think of was that they didn't want their generous donation to be anonymous; they wanted me to know exactly who was responsible....

These delightful folks made my socks go up and down!

At the end of the Fest season, I was surprised at the amount my Leaflings brought in. What would have been just another ordinary year for me was significantly up for a change, and it was all due to the Leaflings and their magick.

It was then that I began to wonder what a whole year of similar exchanges would be like. Which is how I decided to make this year The Year of the Experiment.

The Art Crawl would be my first opportunity to try it out. But with only a few hours before the Crawl began, my head was all over the place about it. I wondered: what if no one 'got' what I was doing and why I was doing it?, what if I try to describe to people why it is that I make my Leaflings and my words don't make sense?, what if the Crawl goes by and no one takes a Leafling home?, or what if they're popular and afterward I discover that all the envelopes are empty??....

Friends visited. (Love you, Sue and Aina!)

I knew what I needed to make monetarily from that Art Crawl to break even, and I was confident that the Universe did, too. That morning as I hung the framed Leaflings on their display grid and fanned the individual ones out in their antique display case before the Crawl began, I made eye contact with each one. We had an understanding. And they had jobs to do. I trusted that each would make a connection with THE person meant to take it home, and in so doing that person would make a fair exchange.

I wasn't sure what to expect from an Art Crawl as I've never been part of one before.... I assumed a Crawl was meant to be more of a 'meet-and-greet-the-artist' and less of an opportunity to make a sale. Yet sales were made. A number of people understood how much my Leaflings meant to me and why I was creating them. And by the end of the day I had a dozen envelopes and some very rewarding memories of some very magickal interactions....

And more friends. (Love you, Suzanne!)

The next day was the same. Once again, friends visited to help me celebrate my first ever Art Crawl. I confused them with the whole envelope thing, but in most cases they obliged and indulged me.... My eldest grandbug, Avery, was there to help me that day and I was more focused on entertaining her than I was on selling my work. Still, at the end of the day I was surprised to discover that there were as many (or more) envelopes in my bag as there'd been the day before.

I crashed on Monday, as usual. And it wasn't until sometime that afternoon that I felt human enough to begin sorting through things from the weekend. And there was the stack of plain brown envelopes, waiting to be opened....

Just like after Fest, I planned to have James do the dirty work when he arrived home that evening. But then it occurred to me that I was separating myself from a very important step in my experiment, the part where I personally accept the exchange. If this was something I was going to do in future, I'd have to learn to carry the whole thing out from start to finish.

This classy lady made my day! (And this sassy kid did, too.)

So I poured myself another cup of coffee and sat down to that stack and prayed aloud over it. I promised the Universe that I'd be grateful for whatever came out of those envelopes. And the first envelope I opened made me cry. Not because it was so bad, but because it was so generous.

Opening the envelopes was humbling. There were a LOT of tears. And, not surprisingly, there was the Empty Envelope. I seem to recall an Empty Envelope last season at Fest, too. It was like a physical reminder to me to accept the bad and the good without judgment.

When I'd opened them all and tallied everything, it took my breath away. I was stunned. And so dang grateful that I cried. Because of those leaves and the effect they had on my visitors, I did more than just break even.

I also learned a LOT. And I was filled with hope.

Now as I look back on my experience, I can't help but read the signs and determine that I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be right now, and doing exactly what I'm supposed to do. I couldn't have imagined this a year ago.

And it stuns me to think that this all began with one leaf.

And one wish.

...

A Little Update

I'm currently over my eyebrows in a watercolor class that I'm in absolute love with, taught by a beautiful friend whose amazing work makes my socks go up and down. I'm easily the slowest student in her online course, I'm sure, probably because I'm completely out of my element there (ACK! Color!). But I've chosen to temporarily forget all that I've taught myself over the years and become a blank canvas (pun intended) and start from absolute scratch, as if I'm finally in Art School learning the basics....

But this class isn't the topic of my post. (I promise to give it equal time here so you can see how things are going.) I watch the lessons online and do my homework during studio time so as to be completely uninterrupted by housework and pets and fill-in-the-blank. That's been my plan all along, anyway, but I find that I'm still frequently interrupted. Only this time by leaves....

I'm pretty sure I'm spending precious class time on them because I'm anxious as hell.... So much is going on in the world right now that I'm really really not OK with, and I don't know what to do. I don't know how to help. I don't even know how to help MYSELF. The best I can come up with is to just breathe....

So when the real world intrudes in my head, calling a halt and just breathing has been a helpful reboot of sorts. But then I have to pick up again with something soothing that I am comfortable and familiar with.

When I'm 'leafing' (just coined this now and it makes me smile), time stops and a conversation starts. It's a convo at its most basic, between me and Everything Else.... It's like the Universe or whatever takes over and creates while my overactive brain enjoys a break, just floating in an imagined blackness like an untethered astronaut staring at stars and listening to the sounds of her breath.... I need to be in that peace for a bit before I can start entertaining thoughts again. Which might also explain why my class progress is slow....

My leaves are getting the paint treatment now because my watercolors are front and center at this time. The results please and soothe me. And I want to share them with you. What do you think?

(P.S.: Since writing last, I've received all sorts of Studio Name feedback (thank you!!). And I've been holed up in my wonder-filled spot at RRAC, drawing/painting on leaves and contemplating my choices.)
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The Leafling Story

I don't have time for blogging today, I really don't. But it's time to talk about this. I just hope I can do so without sounding too stupid....

Not long ago, I had an emotional crisis while watching news reports about terrorist attacks and police shootings and Donald Trump, climate change, parents murdering their children, floods and fires and fill-in-the-blank. The whole world was in chaos and needed help, and here I was with nothing at all to offer.

It was about that time that I began creating my leaflings. I'd go for a walk, find a leaf, take it home, and draw on it; wash, rinse, repeat. Faces, mostly. Sometimes I'd write a wish on the back -- "Mother Earth, may your heart be healed" -- things like that. Then I'd release them on the wind to work their magick.

Doing this helped me. In my head I saw each leaf go on to spark a little change, even if all it did was fall to the curb and decompose. Then I began imagining that each was discovered by the one person who needed it most, someone who looked down at the earth and saw the earth looking back. I liked to think that that person was suddenly kissed by magick and began seeing the wonder and beauty in everything, and they began paying it forward. In my head I was changing the world one leaf at a time....

I know that my few friends and fans on my Facebook page like to know that I'm being creative, so I shared what I was doing on social media. Thankfully, it all got the reaction that I was hoping for. Nothing crazy, mind you; just a few folks being charmed by my efforts. The fact that I'd spent time creating these leaflings only to let them blow away was a big part of what charmed them.

It was suggested to me that I add a hashtag or my email address or my website URL on the back of each leaf, so I can hear when and if one was ever found, and also because people will want to know who the artist is. But the idea made me uncomfortable. I didn't want anyone to see my work and wonder about me; I wanted them to see my work and be filled with wonder.

Occasionally someone would comment. "I wish I lived in your neighborhood; it would be so exciting to look down and find one!" A friend wrote that he saw a stand of old milkweed with clusters of empty pods still clinging to their stalks and thought to himself, "Wouldn't it be cool if Delayne drew on one of those?", then went on to say that he'd simply walked away with a smile, telling himself that I'd drawn on them all. When I read that, it was like everything came Full Circle.

My leaflings were making their magick.

But it wasn't long before other comments surfaced: "I hope you're weatherproofing them somehow so they last." (But then they won't decompose; I'm trying to commit a random act of wonder, not poison the earth....) Or, "I live half a world away; I'll never find one!" (How do you know this? They're MAGICK.) Or, "Can I commission you to make one of these for me?" (You're talking about ME taking MONEY now, right?) Or, "Where do you sell these and how much do they cost?" (Yeah, you're talking about money....)

Here's the thing:

I'm just the delivery system. Mine is just the hand that helps the Other Side make contact. Some of us are already 'awake' and familiar with the divine, but others need a miracle, a bit of serendipity, something completely unexpected (like seeing a leaf that sees you back) to make eye contact and kiss them on the heart. To me, it's magick of the highest order.

And I sincerely believe that by working this way -- with fallen leaves and their impermanence -- the message is rather like a glamourbomb (look it up), free to decompose and release its wonder-filled stardust in the air like a perfume. Does that make sense?

That being said, let me repeat that I am just the delivery system. I'm assisting the Fairies, let's say. I'm a minor part of the team. And the thought of taking money in exchange for the small thing I'm doing gives me hives. Money is Donald Trump. It's greed. Yes, yes, I know that I call myself an 'artist' and that I try to sell my work so that I can live to do it all again another day, but don't think it doesn't bug me to have to do this. I've written dozens of blog posts (like this one) about my aversion to being paid for what I do and how bad I am at business so I won't repeat myself. Let's just say that if there was a way to do what I do every day, share my work with others, and still eat and pay my mortgage, I would do it.

But no. Money factors in here, so I deal with it as best I can. I sell my artwork. But this? This is different.

Because others have asked to see my leaflings in person, I've chosen to bring them with me to Fest this season. They're in a display case on my counter, and when people appreciate them I tell them the whole long story. Some get it, some don't. Some lecture me. Some roll their eyes.... I understand. In a place where NOTHING is free, where tickets for a family cost a fortune, where costumed street characters roam the grounds with tip baskets hanging from their belts and seed money tucked in their cleavage, where the smallest of interactions come with the expectation of reward, where food booths have tip jars on their counters next to the napkins, where you can't request a song without waving a five-dollar bill first, what I'm doing is so dang dumb that I can hardly type this without shame.

And smarter heads remind me that it's dumb. Like they did, repeatedly, this past weekend. "This is a business. Take peoples' money." And I really do listen, I swear; I'm just trying to take their advice in a way that is comfortable to me. And I think I've come up with a solution. Maybe.

For the moment, this is where I'm at:

• All the leaflings I create, starting today, will be gently coated with a water-based solution to protect their tiny faces and keep them looking fresh. (This way, should one find its way to you, it will weather the trip, thus allowing you to frame it, gift it, repurpose it, or release it.)
• And if you live 'half a world away,' you can still 'find' one of my leaflings, because I'll mail it to you.
• And you can commission me to make one if you need some magick in your life (or know someone who does). How much do I charge? I don't. (Read on....)
• And if you're at Fest and one of my leaflings 'calls' to you, then you're obviously the one meant to 'find' it. Give it a good home. (Read on....)

I never meant for these to be 'free.' (Magick isn't free; there's always a price.) But in this case I'll let you decide what this is worth to you and what you want to give in exchange. All I ask is that if you wish to pay me in real money, you do so without putting cash or coin in my hands. Give it to me in an envelope and I promise someone else will open and deal with it; I won't know if you think my work is worth 50 bucks or 50 cents or 50 paperclips, so there's no humiliation factor for either of us. Or make a donation on this site (I'll link a Paypal button or something here if/when I can figure out how to do so). Or do something else like rescue an animal, donate some books, read to a kid, fill-in-the-blank. Just move the magick forward, 'k?

Because the Fairies have given me a serious job: to begin their work in this little way and make sure it continues -- without pause -- to heal the Earth and its inhabitants one magick leafling/one kind deed/one act of wonder at a time.

And if you so choose, it can be your job too.

And we can heal the Earth together.

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