This morning, Mom dropped me off at UPEI, whose beautifully ugly Brutalist concrete library has been my haven of late — just as it was in my teens, when I went there to read all the pop-psychology books in an effort to learn how to use my mind.
So, not much has changed. Except now I’m creating instructive articles andillustrations for my client’s audience and trying to figure out my life by writing and drawing in my sketchbook.
It’s easy to think of artists as insecure little attention-seekers, but my experience today in the library reminded me of what art is for: processing experience.
Or maybe it’s not even that, it’s just stating our experience. Having a thought, opinion, or emotion at all does reassure us that there is a perceiver (us), but I wasn’t motivated by any Cartesian inquiry today. Simply drawing what was in my heart was a balm.
I’m weary, beat, tired of trying to guess and hope at what’s going to happen with my dad, trying to reach out to someone who is closed to me, despite our love for each other. Drawing that today — admitting it in words and pictures — was comforting, even if it solves or advances nothing.
I’m reminded of the Monet exhibition in Edinburgh, where amid the sedate fields and ponds I found one shocking picture of the artist’s wife on her deathbed:
How courageous, I thought, to turn to one’s art in the worst possible time. Now I think it wasn’t courage, but simple necessity. When there’s no comfort to be had, nothing to do, at least expression is available. Before we can hope to understand, we first have to look at what it is we’re trying to understand.
Not to paint too a dire a picture of my family. We’ve been very lucky in our lives, and the situation with Dad could rebound some more.
I stayed here following the dictates of my heart; but now I’m at a loss. I want to do anything I can for my dad, but whatever needs doing has to come from him — whether it ultimately will or not.
P.S. My mum and I just watched a BBC Scotland program called “Two Doors Down” that aired at New Year, and we had a right giggle at it. Ahh, that’s what we needed: some laughter.