It’s a wonderful life

Originally Published 12-14-2011

OK. I love that movie. And I cry every year around this time when I catch it on TV in the middle of the night -- because I have insomnia or indigestion or a worry eating away at the edge of my serenity. It's not like I don't know what's coming. I see it every year. And every time, the sentiment of it does its magic on my poor heart. And you know what? It is a wonderful life.

If you are a bitter realist, prone to negativity, biting sarcasm and mean-spiritedness, stop reading now.

I am not saying I don't have bouts of those qualities myself at the end of a pay period when I have 5 bucks and no gas in the car, or in the cold night of winter when I wake up with a turmoil in my head -- its just that I am of a mind these days to stop those negative things in myself and to counterattack them with positive thoughts, deeds and feelings. Because that is my true power in this life -- to manage my own way of being.

On that note, and in the spirit of the movie, here are 15 profound things that people have said to me through the years in my personal and work life that were pivotal in making me who I am here and now. Some of them seemed totally random at the time, but luckily I have an incredible memory, and I have internalized them into the way I exist on this earth. Lives touch other lives. Read them. Laugh about them. Maybe they will help you too.

1. "Helen, don't hammer like a girl -- and get that damn nail out of your mouth!" -- my Dad, who I miss every day.

2. "Oh, honey, you are beautiful no matter what those mean girls say. They are ugly inside -- and one day, they will be ugly outside too -- and you will still be beautiful." -- from my beautiful mother, who left this place too soon.

3. "Helen, you don't need a metals degree. Are you crazy? You have been earning a living with your art for 20 years. Why do you need another piece of paper that shows you know what you already know how to do?" -- Sara Olson, my CE metals teacher.

4. "Those are the words of a poet. Only poets notice things like that. Why don't you try to write more?" -- Kitta MacPherson, science editor at the Newark Star Ledger.

5. "Oh, don't give that free rent in your brain!" -- my dear friend Pat Wood, who left this world too soon.

6. "Holy crap, mom! Are you sure you know what the hell you're doing?" -- my son Kyle, who reluctantly helped me -- as we discovered that yes, I do know how to put together and fire up an acetylene torch.

7. "It's just a piece of metal." -- Jim Dailing, my stone setting instructor at Peter's Valley Craft Center.

8. "Helen -- you give everything, everything to a job. But it won't ever give back. And here you are -- in anguish. Stop. Your gifts as an artist are for you. You are not obligated to give them to the job. Just work here. Keep what is yours." -- George Frederick, a great art director who can paint like hell.

9. "You really have no idea how wonderful you are, do you?" -- my closest metalhead friend Lexi Erickson

10. "My beautiful Helencita, do not worry over that. They are just those little things of the life. Do not worry over that. We have only one life. Everything es todo bien." -- Jaimito Carvajal

11. "Oh stop. It's not like you have to wear a bikini on the cover of the magazine!" -- Linda Ligon, founder of Interweave Press, dismissing my discomfort over appearing in an instructional DVD.

12. "Try to find an environment where you can manifest who you truly are." -- Albert Paley, CoMA Conference, 2010

13. "Insight comes when the mind is not in charge." -- Michael Good, in a metals workshop, Denver, 2010

14. "Art for me is the product of the creative process. That product can be ugly, beautiful, it can be conceptual or a narrative, or evoke an emotion. So, what is art? The first time you do something, it is art. The second time, it is work." -- Michael Boyd, my best brother -- who isn't.

15. "Oh stop worrying about making art. We're getting paid, right?" -- Andre Malok, a brilliantly talented illustrator.

Have a wonderful day.

Staying on course

Originally Published 12-13-2011

I have been insanely busy over the past few months navigating through an office move, several extracurricular projects, a very full workload, a new and wonderfully fulfilling relationship, and some home improvement thrown in for entertainment. But I haven't been so busy that I have failed to notice a disturbing level of negativity, blaming and stubbornness all around me -- particularly in the arenas of business and work.

It is incredible how many times in the past few weeks I have hit a wall someone has built around themselves because they have focused all of their energy outward to prevent whatever it is they are trying to prevent from happening. It's hard not to get sucked into it -- especially when it seems that the force of the circling negativity threatens to pull everything down and in.

Believe me, I am not perfect -- I often wake in the night fearing we are all going to hell in a hand basket. I am super-efficient and prone to dismissing what isn't working well by just letting a bridge completely burn to the ground because it seems like too much effort to stop it.

I made a pact with myself earlier this year to accept and embrace that the only thing that is really in my power is the ability to manage myself in space and time. I can't fix other people. I can't make someone else fix themselves. I can't change another persons way of being or replace what they are missing in their own heart, mind or soul -- that is their own life's work.

So, how do I fight it? How can I help somebody who needs help? How do I do battle with the negativity monster without losing myself in the war?

Every day, I thank whatever is out there for giving me this life. I pet my cats and tell my loved ones they matter to me. I thank myself for getting my lazy butt into the gym and doing some cardio, and for topping it off with a healthy meal. And, I am thankful and extremely grateful I have skills and the talent to provide me with a means to support myself in the current economic climate. I am grateful that I am mentally and physically able to work very hard and even do extra work to stay afloat in the churning storm. And, I fervently hope and believe in my heart that calm will come again.

Yes, I am grateful for this life, because I have seen what it might have been if circumstances were different when I was born. I try not to blame, even though the temptation is great. Instead of blaming, I repeat my mantra: " All I can do is manage myself in space and time." And then, I act on that mantra and manage to find a way in myself to turn negativity around and find something to be thankful for in whatever vexing thing is in front of me. When someone close to me gets sucked into negativity, I try to steer myself clear of their spinning, and then point out a direction they might navigate toward -- to change negative thoughts they are locked into. I accept those things I have no power to change, and instead work toward keeping myself and my ideals intact in the face of it.

Try to find the good. Focus on that good and keep going. Help others to see the good. And be grateful for it.

It started with the hammer

Originally Published 9-7-2011

Those protruding nails on the front porch started it. I was tired of catching the sole of my shoe on the same nails over and over again. So I grabbed my trusty carpenter's hammer and whacked the crap out of the entire line of them. That run of nails along the one floor joist had worked their way up and out of the deck over the years -- like a line of shark's teeth lying in wait for an unsuspecting foot or shoe to attack -- with rusty vengeance.

So, I went down the line, boom, boom, boom, nail after terrible nail. And somehow, the act of hammering down those evil nail demons pulled me up and out of the well of introspection that I have been inside of for a few weeks. The simple joy of the strike and the boom made me wake up and look out instead of in. My arm and my body remembered the feeling of the hammering and the comfort of that effort. I saw the hammer head drive the nails down into the wood one by one in incredible super slow-mo. And it made me want to go back to my empty studio again. And it made me really want to work instead of just going through the motion of work.

I hammered metal all day yesterday and today I am back.  I am home again after the long journey in. Change does that. My mind was doing battle with a terrible thing, and the war has finally ended. I have emerged. I am OK. And now I know what I am going to do. I know how I am going to be. I know I can't make everybody happy no matter how hard I try. So, I am going to start with me, and I have given myself permission -- really, really -- to disappoint people who have unrealistic expectations of me that I do not wish to fulfill. I will no longer give away energy and time to people who have none of their own and only take mine. Sorry.

So now, back to the hammer. The project on my bench and the anvil are waiting. you do your work and make your own way in the world, just like I am. You work, and I'll work. I'll share with you when I can spare the extra energy. If you play nice and share too.

Today's tip: I have custom ground several Delrin forming hanmmers to match the profile of my steel forming hammers, so I have the option to either gently move or aggressively move sheet in the same bay of my raising stake. Sweet!

The demand to “GO!”

Originally Published 8-31-2011

I have never understood where or how the driving need to "GO!" rises up and makes itself known to me.

When I say "GO!", I mean go away at the same time that I am here. My mind and feelings are far, but I am right here next to everything, doing the same crap I do all the time. Going is a feeling or a thought or some other thing of the human condition -- but the urgency to GO! sometimes consumes me with the same intensity as hunger or thirst. It is instinctual and rises out of the middle of my body and I can't think of anything else. I can't do anything else. I am powerless in the face of it and I know I will be damaged somehow deep in my soul if I do not GO!. It is like nothing else. And it will not be denied. I am a shell of this person you thought you knew and standing right here next to you, but I am not here, really. It just looks that way.

This is a source of tension and conflict for me. Because of the obligations. Accomplished people like me have many obligations, and people relying on them. Some obligations bring me comfort and joy -- for the most part. Except when the need to GO! comes to consume me. Then, those obligations cause me to become angry and resentful. I push them away, sometimes with violent force. I get crabby. I ignore the phone. I blow off my friends. I don't rehearse the choreography. I become terse and sarcastic when interrupted. I eat crap and I don't go to the gym -- because I will die inside if I am not left alone to deal with the elusive thing that is calling me like a siren. I isolate myself from everyone and even become self destructive in an effort to escape the demands of obligation, routine, boredom and predictable mediocrity -- and I GO! to examine the thing that dances there on the periphery. I have no choice.

I can be difficult, arrogant and aloof. I know I disappoint people and I know I make them angry, too -- that is a price I pay, and I pay it often. But I cannot lay down and die inside just to meet the needs of somebody else when it is time to GO!. 

I've learned not to make an effort to keep casual friends because I know it takes an unusually strong person to stick with me and I can't bear dealing with disappointed people when they discover that I am there and then not there with equal intensity. Sometimes they stay, sometimes not.

The up side is that the few who hang with me through the tempest will be rewarded when I come back from following the siren song. I will be there for them stronger and better than ever,  because I had to Go to keep my soul alive. In the meantime, I am sorry for the lack of emails and phone calls, dirty laundry, blown deadlines, cat hair on the stairs, weeds in the garden, forgotten appointments, unpaid bills, empty pantry, lack of kibble and crappy dinner. I don't really care about those things right now, but I promise I will be back again soon.

Please wait for me, because I had to GO! . . .

Sometimes, life gets in the way of Art

Originally Published 6-11-2011

Where the heck have you been? I've heard that about 90 times in the past 10 days.

OK, I admit it -- I haven't been here in a while, either. I had good intentions, really. But you've heard that old saying about the road to the devil and good intentions.

It's life. My life. Something I haven't really paid too much attention to in a decade really, unlike my work, which I was consumed by 24/7. But my life -- the real one -- finally jumped up and tapped me on the back and said, "Hey You! Pay attention. You only get one of me, and you've been working too hard for too long. You've been focused away for a long time and you need to stop. Please, rest now. It's time to live."

So, I listened. I went to an enchanted tropical island. I rested. I ate low on the food chain. My only worry was what to make for the next meal. I was unplugged and disconnected. Sounds of nature. Naps in the hammock. Snorkeling in the sea. Stars in the night sky. Love and laughter. No buzz. No news. No internet, no nothing but the pulse of  life -- the real one. And, it took a week or so, but I remembered who I am. I remembered what I love, what I want, and what really matters to me.

When I got back, everything here was the same, only more so. I am not.

I am finally fixing a bunch of annoying things that I let go for almost ever because I was working so hard elsewhere. Things of my life that matter but I didn't make time for. Doors that needed hinges. Paint in the hallway. The attic steps. The porch. The ugly pink living room. Too-large clothes I don't wear. The thistle eradication project.  The basement crap. The throwing out, purging and pushing away what and who was there in my life once and isn't any more. And, the gathering in, embracing and welcoming what and who is there now.

Including me.

Sorry I haven't written in a while. But I am back again.
And, the latch on the second floor bathroom door works!

Todays Tip: Has nothing to do with metalwork.
First, wait for a still, rain free day. Then, to win the invasive weed war against Canada Thistle, cut the stem to about 3 inches tall and use an eyedropper to drip Roundup inside the hollow center of the stem. Watch those evil plants that you have been battling for 6 growing seasons die a tortured death over the course of 2 or 3 days and finally have your revenge. Then, celebrate victory and go to the garden center for some new plants to fill the real estate you suddenly have after so many years...