Botanicals or Flower Power

I've come a long way.

When I first started blogging, I was in such a terrible place.

In 2011, I lost someone I loved to suicide.  

I spent two years trying to figure out how to deal with it, and failing miserably.

I eventually realized that I needed to find an outlet.

I needed something that I was interested in enough to keep doing, 

but bad enough at that I had to concentrate, to really pour myself into it to see improvement.

Art and art journaling was what I came to.

In 2013, I started a blog, sweetredclover@blogspot.com, because I wanted to share what I was making.  I wanted feedback so that I could improve.

I quickly found out that I could say things in the blog that I would never say in 'real life'.

Making art was a way for my subconscious mind to release what it was holding onto.

Writing the blog became a way for my extremely analytical mind to look at my art and figure out what it meant.  It was a way for my fractured mind to understand itself.  

I used this process over and over and over to the point where I could finally do it all without the art or the blogging...it seemed like the parts of my brain that had been kept caged in their separate boxes were let loose and could live together in harmony.

So I quit blogging and art journaling fell to the wayside.

I didn't need it for a long time.

And that's ok.

"If I am worth anything later, I am worth something now.
For wheat is wheat, even if people think it is grass in the beginning."
-Vincent Van Gogh

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I'm very lucky.  The pandemic has not effected me like it has so many other people.

My life remained very much the same the entire time.

I'm considered an essential worker, so my job continued on as normal.

I'm a really great hermit, so I didn't miss interacting with people.

I don't go places on vacation.

I don't enjoy going to stores, so having a reason to go less often was great as far as I'm concerned.

There is one way I've been affected through out this whole thing though.

I feel like I've felt the collective frustration of the world.

Everybody else's angst has seeped into me as though by osmosis.

Or maybe it was having the choices in life taken away for a time.

I might not want to go on vacation normally, but if I changed my mind, I could pack my bags and go.

Then suddenly, that option was taken away.

Maybe lack of choice was the real culprit in my frustration...in a lot of people's frustration, I'd guess.

But, either way, the feeling was there.

And when I have feelings I can't shake, I find that the combination of art and writing helps me to come to terms with things.

What a great leaf that is.

I feel happier today than I have in a long time.

I don't know if I am depressed, but certainly there is a general malaise about me that has been lingering.

Today, I feel positive though.

That's a hopeful feeling, because I've been sad and angry for reasons I can't put my finger on entirely.  

And I think reasons are important.

If you know the why of things, you can change them.

Without knowing what's wrong, how can you fix it?

So having these moods and not understanding them has been a bit of a spiral for me.

I'm sad and angry for something I can't explain and then that makes me sadder and angrier.

And sadder and angrier.

And sadder and angrier.

Sorry for the glare...I don't know how to get rid of the glare on shiny things when I take pictures...I'm sure there's a way...I just have to find it.

But today, with very little explanation, I don't feel so bad.

Or maybe the explanation is that I'm on the right track with restarting the blogging and the arting.

Maybe my brain is saying it's glad I'm starting to listen again...

Whatever the reason, I can admit that I'm hopeful today.

And that I hope to be hopeful tomorrow.