Saturday night I was full of hate. Not toward any one person, just hating that I couldn’t go out for a freaking hour and a half without some kind of toddler disaster occurrence pulling me back home. Hating the lack of freedom I now have as a parent. Hating my incredible lack of time to be on my own and think about nothing in particular. I don’t know about you, but some of my best ideas have come out of thinking about nothing. The brain needs to drain, you know? A person can’t be on call 24/7 for too long before they lose their proverbial marbles. I know I asked for this change in my life, this addition of human/s to our house, these children. I do not regret or resent them being here. I just want a break is all. And I don’t think that’s too much to ask for.
On an up note, my pal Esha moved into her new house a few weeks back and she has a garage in the alley behind said house she is willing to give me to paint in. What an incredibly generous thing. At her last house she let me paint on her back porch. It is very important for me to be able to leave my house to paint. I cannot work at my house for a variety of reasons:
- someone is always trying to get my attention
- someone is always asking me questions
- there is always some kind of chore that is deemed more important than me creating something
- there is no quiet here
- there are children, two years old, who live here
- the fumes from the turpentine and oil paint mediums are not healthy for little kids to breathe
There are probably many more reasons I need a space outside our little paradise of a row house, but those are the first to come to mind. There is a lone window in Esha’s garage, which looks so cool in photos. I hope I can get my shit together, clean out the space a bit, and get to painting again. I feel like some of that special necessary art energy is piling up in my head lately. That means either I create something or I will soon become depressed and despondent. Better to paint a picture. Cheaper than therapy.
20 Fingers, 20 Toes 
Hate… a natural survival reaction. No shame. We’re young, we’re creative, there is a solution. There’s a way. (sketchbook too) Looks like a good way to re-route life and physically schedule it. Needs are needs man! Things happen organically.
And you’re not alone.
I love reading your angry posts because your frustration at being caged amidst love and learning and wonderfulness makes me feel like less of an ass. Because, good f*ck, I feel caged.
Isn’t it amazing what an afternoon alone to just follow your creative impulses will do? Not naptime creating, which feels scarcely better than naptime laundry and chores, but leave-the-house time where you allow something to metaphorically flow out of you…it’s delicious. (Technically, leave-the-house time that allows something to physically flow out of you is lovely, too, since peeing—without people screaming and running with scissors and chasing the cats and banging on glass and digging through forbidden drawers and crying and screaming and keeping all your thoughts, good and bad, shoved back into your brain so hard it hurts—by yourself is lovely, too.)
A big thank you to friends and family who give us a room of our own in which to paint, write, photograph, compose, weave, knit, sculpt, garden, or sing by ourselves. Kudos to those enablers.
Cheers,
Christine
thank you supportive reader friends! support is important. i am relieved to hear i am not alone. i feel very alone much of the time, despite being surrounded by people constantly.