The Journey
untitled, 1992, 30″ x 22″, monoprint
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I surprise myself sometimes that I still have the core of faith at my center.
I still love this precious life.
And most of the time I want to stick around.
I probably would not be so keen if the whole theater of the thing wasn’t still entertaining.
These days though, I watch from my witness perch and it is too often dark out there.
Out in the world, sure, but closer to home as well.
But is this bad?
I sense it is all part of the plan and my job is to stand for what I stand for, make a good life and handle my own inner violence.
Flip flop..flip flop.. change happens so how shall we hold it?
It embarrasses me that my inner terrain is not more even.
The GREAT DAY of yesterday has slipped into another costume as days are wont to do..
Often, when sense is out of reach, I go here, to Mary Oliver’s work:
________
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The Journey- by Mary Oliver
.
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice—
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do—
determined to save
the only life you could save.
Great Day
detail, textile design
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Went gallivanting yesterday.
I called an old friend I hadn’t seen in a few years as his relationship with another woman precluded ours.We had separated on good terms but there seemed no room for me in his life after that so I let it be.
I got gutsy the other day and called him up.
I broke our silence recently and called him. I asked if he still wanted to be my friend.
There are people in life with whom I have formed a secure and satisfying bond and neither distance nor time seems to have any effect.
This friend is one of those gifts; too valuable to toss into the corner with an “Oh, well…”
He told me that yes, indeed, he would like to be my friend.
Interestingly, he is in the process of unweaving his prior relationship but I had no notion of picking up where we left off.. I want him solely as my friend.
When I look to my inner circle these days, safety (physical, emotional, spiritual), an ability to see outside ones self, a good dose of irreverence and the capacity to swim in deep waters are hallmarks of those I keep close to me.
I listen to myself say “feeling safe” over and over in my life. What does that mean?
In the case of yesterday it meant that when he drove my car I trusted his skill.
I felt he kept his eye on me all day in an unobtrusive way, watching out for my well being.
We drove away from Santa Fe and felt the static of the city stayed behind us as we found hidden red dirt roads that looked like good picnic possibilities.
He found a great spot but it was over hill and dale and outside my normal comfort zone of navigating my walker.
I started to go into my default “NO.”
He said, “Just piggyback. Grab hold my neck and I’ll carry you.”
At first, I balked but his offer sounded so normal and without any weirdness attached to it that I said ok.
We sat in this great spot by the river for awhile till the bugs got us and decided to find a better spot.
It was time for me to get up from the ground.
I didn’t know how.
Usually, I have something to push up with but not here.
“I don’t know how to do this, ” I say.
We try a number of different solutions and start laughing.
It all felt so natural (almost) and fun.
I finally made it up and piggybacked to the car while squealing like a schoolgirl.
That whole thing felt safe.
I am so damned uses to the gravity of being CAREFUL and truncating my life in so many ways because of disability.
Yesterday helped me see and feel options.
I certainly DID NOT ‘look good’ as I struggled to get to the picnic place or try to stand up.
NOTHING WAS NORMAL.
I have a new normal.
And I saw it can be fun.
In order for me to settle into my new normal, I will keep those around me I feel I can test untried territory with and risk failure AND success.
I know it’s all an inside job but the company one keeps helps open sticky doors.
Self Portrait
“SEED”, 48″ x 48″, 2004,m/m
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Most of my art tends toward self portraiture in the sense that I do my best work when I don’t know what I’m doing.
Rather, instead of DECIDING exactly what I think the piece should be I ALLOW it to emerge and in that way I always learn something about myself by letting the work teach me.
Sometimes this happens immediately as I am completing a piece or it could creep up on me years, even decades later.
Certainly, there are themes that have arisen over the years in varying colors and forms.
This is one such theme; that of striated layers with a seed-like form in various states of gestation.
So much of my work has included layering and a sort of hierarchy evident in the obvious ‘below and above’ the horizontal orientation.
What I have learned over these many years intimately entangled in a tempestuous relationship with a chronic illness is that it is all relative.
The climb and the energy output in trying to reach the summit always held such a gleam.
The physical test and the sweat outpour involved in putting one foot still higher on the ladder when the air was too damn thin.
Now, I can’t lift my leg high enough to clear just one measly rung on the thing.
But, funny enough, I am so much stronger.
Not the physical kind at the moment but the sort of strength inherent in the seed; the force that makes us burn through the rocks and weight of earth and keep doing it until we can’t.
And take a rest to gather ourselves gaining strength from the most mundane of things; reviving ourselves with the slow sensuality of water seeping through the dry ground and the impossibly rich smell of ready earth.
And we press on..
These things are my church. This is where I pray.
The small and weak and silent and threadbare..
How loud they have become to my ears.
And how very satisfying their song.
And I press on…
Fur
detail of ceramic sculpture
_________________________
.
.
FUR
.
My dog has tan fur.
.
It comes out to meet me like
.
patient medicine.
.
.
-CA
.
.
Slight Obstacle
untitled monoprint, 1990, 22″ x 30″
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It seems after a certain amount of time on the planet one would be quite sure that any less-than-fabulous emotion or bump in the road would likely be different an hour from now or tomorrow would find the situation a distant memory…
So then why is it when a new symptom adds itself to my list or I find myself mired in foggy territory do I KNOW THE SITUATION IS PERMANENT??????
I find it utterly ridiculous that I do not know at this point that depression lasts for two days max in my world (mostly) and symptoms are often ghost-like in their arrival and departure.
It is quite unacceptable that I lock down into these states of being leaving all thoughts of possibility and reality checking behind.
MS is scary shit, no doubt about it.
Just pause, Cath, and let the twitching eye have it’s day or the renegade toe curling likely will unfurl tomorrow.
I want so VERY much to remember when the demonic iron gates of hell go up that I am quite sure I saw a faulty join in the grid; easy enough for a girl my size to slither through.
I think I could still make it with a vagrant toe and a hyperactive eye.
Yes, I am quite sure I can.
New Territory
installation untitled, 1991, ceramic, earth, coal
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I feel inclined to mention the fact I have felt pretty ‘off’ the last week.
It shows up as less-than-great writing and sort of threadbare thinking.
I could beat myself up for my ‘less-than-perfectness.’
But I’ve done so much of that over the years that it positively bores me.
I know by now that when my life (mind, emotions, connection to God, housekeeping-inner and outer) starts becoming messy it likely means I am in the midst of big change.
And I am.
This territory I am moving into is new to me and negotiating it means making a lot of mistakes as we come to learn each other.
The best I can do is allow the messiness and forgive myself.
And I can.
And I do.
Desert
untitled objects, 2000, 7″ x 1″, ceramic
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LAUNDRY
.
.
The heat in a life
.
.
Wrung me out and I’m hanging
.
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Formless and watching.
.
.
-CA
.
.
The Honey Guides
“HAND”, 1985, 5′ x 44″, pigment on wool flannel
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THE HONEY GUIDES
Once upon a time there was a girl who had a secret place.
It was up on a hill covered in long grass.
Sometimes she would snuggle down and make a nest for herself
when her parents were bugging her or if she felt alone.
She never really fit well anywhere.
She was well liked though she belonged to no group.
Her best friends were Nature Spirits.
They would whisper and sing softly in her ear.
Her fledgling heart was always soothed.
As she grew older she returned again and again to her grassy hill
and the Spirits who tended her so long and so well.
One day she noticed that far away across the river, in a little cottage
Smoke was rising from the chimney.
In all these years from her secret spot she had never noticed this before.
She became curious and decided to pack a little bag
And make the long journey to the cottage.
She was cold. Perhaps she could find some warmth by the fire.
She walked for days, for years and a lifetime.
As she finally approached the cottage she heard laughter.
I sounded like a party.
She timidly knocked on the door and all the noise inside stopped.
The door creaked open and in a blaze of light and warmth she saw a table.
It was set with crystal and silvery things.
There were many places set at this table.
From each chair came a welcoming smile from the most radiant people
The girl had ever seen.
She felt warm and tingly inside as she noticed
There was a special place set just for her.
She sat and someone began to speak.
“We are the HONEY GUIDES. We are here to teach you about sweetness
And nurture and family and love.”
“We will hold your hand while you eat and your heart will grow
And you will always know where to go for food.”
And at that- a lovely woman with golden hair
Began to sing a heartbreakingly beautiful song,
A blessing was given and the feast began.
The girl understood that her whole life so far was in preparation for this-
Her seat at the tribal table.
She was no longer alone.
She felt her heart grow wide and wider still.
And she saw it was true what she had been told;
That part of The Journey must be made alone
But for the heart to become ripe and full
One needs a hand to hold.
————Cathy Aten
Will
untitled monoprint, 30″ x 22″, 1991
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I wonder how much using our will gets us into a thriving life?
As Americans, we worship the brute power of willing ourselves to tough it out or make it happen or ‘against all odds..GO!’ as in wartime or just getting an ornery kid to school.
I use an inordinate amount of energy WILLING myself toward an existence I see may be larger than my physicality can manage.
I am looking at a lot of ideas I have about participation in the world in what I might call ‘big’ ways; activities that are service oriented and feel inspiring to me.
But the more I put energy into trying to get them off the ground the more I meet up with silence from those that could help me do it.
I asked myself the other day: what if I just STOPPED using my will and segued into ALLOWANCE?
Just waited till I was moved to do?
A giant wave of peace washed over me.
I took that as a confirmation that I am somehow on the right track here.
You’d think if we took the feeding tube of WILL out of our arm we might just collapse from inertia.
But NO!
There is something sweeter behind it, I am seeing.
Something potent and purposeful and wider than the narrow band of will.
WHO ARE WE WITHOUT THAT INCESSANT SOLDIERING THROUGH LIFE THAT WE DO?
Excuse me as I take the faint trace of this trail I see at the edge of a dark wood….
On The Wind
“MARKS”, 1999, 11″ x 11″, m/m
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I just spent an hour writing about the oil spill.
And I deleted the whole thing because I let myself start feeling into the weird dampness in the skies of Santa Fe the past couple days…
I was realizing there is much, much more on this wind from the South than we can perceive.
The stuff between the lines is always most potent and that vast territory is holding me hostage.
I am rendered wordless this morning.
I need a new language .
I’ll leave it at that until something makes it’s way to the surface and wants to be said.