Happy Evening -I should absolutely be packing for our Seattle trip right now, since we will find ourselves on a bus to the airport at 4:45 a.m. and it's already 9:15 p.m. and I started the evening sleepy.
Why in God's name, then, am I posting to my little blog?
Why indeed.
Today marks the 365 Virgen. A year ago, we were living in Tucson, getting ready to travel the next day to Chicago to visit with my sister. We were planning a big move and a trip for the following May (now), and I decided to do a Virgen a Day to mark the year between that first night in Chicago on May 22, 2008 and our last night in Tucson on May 21, 2009.
Except, as we all know, we're not in Tucson. Our stuff is not in a Tucson storage facility and we're not getting ready to head out in the morning on a three-month camping adventure that will take us up the Pacific coast, across British Columbia, and down the Rockies to land in our new home in Colorado, where we'll secure housing and then drop back into Tucson to collect our stuff from storage (don't ask about the cats in that plan - we had not yet found a solution for four-cat boarding when the plan changed anyway). We're not sad about leaving our UofA jobs nor excited about starting our new jobs in Colorado, and we're not landing in Ft. Collins.
That was the original plan and we all know how that changed drastically and for the absolute best. We've been in Colorado for seven months now - four in Denver and the last three in Louisville. While we have our eyes on the area just south of Ft. Collins for future home sites and I work at a university, it's not CSU.
Through all those changes, though, have been a Virgen a Day. I don't know if there is anything I've done with intent for a year like this. There are plenty of unconscious routines that navigate me through a day, but nothing with the purpose and intention of sitting down each night and making a Virgen tile to commemorate the day.
In the last year, besides the moving (twice), there have been job changes, Boris' diabetes diagnosis and all the learning that came with that, my Dad's liver cancer diagnosis and all the learning that comes with that, and myriad other changes I'm not even clocking right now as I quickly type this out.
It's been quite a year and, unlike other big years, I have five or so cardboard boxes of Virgen tiles to show for it. I don't know if they make it any more meaningful, but they do make it more tangible.
I've gotten so used to doing my nightly Virgen now, I don't think I could stop and, more importantly, don't want to. That said, I don't want to be writing a year from now and talk about the five or so more boxes of Virgen tiles I have, so I'm going to switch formats for the next year.
Instead of doing the Virgens on tile, I'm going to be doing them in a book-sized (like novel, not coffee table) journal. I'll still take the pictures and post the images with my thoughts, but it won't be a series of ceramic tiles anymore.
And what of those tiles? Who knows. What does one do with 365 Virgen tiles? Most of them are 4x4 ceramic tiles, but the first handful were on wood (what I had at the time). I'm going to keep them in our root cellar for now and wait to see what inspiration comes across me. I never finished the monthly group shots, so I might could pull those out and finish those, but don't know that I will. The whole process was supposed to be organic, so to backtrack now seems inauthentic.
Okay, time to pack. Let's talk about these last Virgens.
The one above is from Monday, May 18th, and marks another anniversary for me - two years since I retired as a smoker. After 11ish years of doing my bit for tobacco, I retired on May 18, 2007. It's been a long two years. If I had known when I started how many systems beyond respiratory smoking affected, I don't think I would have started, and if I had known when I went to quit how many systems would whack out, I don't think I would have decided to retire.
I think the only way I was able to break the stats and successfully retire on my first attempt (without even using nicotine safety netting) was that I was totally open to being a train-wreck, hot mess for as long as needed. Good love goes to my partner, who put up with amazing sweat smells those first weeks (really, really powerful sweat smell - bad.), emotional explosions, minutes of catatonic staring, and all sorts of hot mess behaviors while I came back to me. And that was just nicotine - God love all those folks who have stepped out of bigger addictions and lived to tell the tale.
On a separate note, I'll point out for my Gay Tobacco Czar partner that, of all the magazines I have on my art table for Virgen use, the only one where I could find cigarette ads was The Advocate - the big, gay magazine. Thanks Big Tobacco, and thanks Big Gay rag for taking their advertising dollars.
Tuesday, May 19th. I had myself a little misunderstanding at work that I made the bad decision to express my frustration about over email. As strong of a writer as I am, email still holds plenty of potential for misplaced tone and, believe me, misunderstandings abounded. After supervisor response to my misunderstood email, I spent the night fluctuating between crying, ranting, snorting "screw 'em" and worrying about being relieved of my duties. Certainly not the best use of one's night, to be sure.
Wednesday, May 20th. I met with my supervisor and we explained to each other what the other had meant and how communication went so awry. It all ended okay, but I found myself apologizing for intent taken that was not my intended message more than once. Because of this day of Contrition, I chose a mission image for the tile. Bless me, supervisor/co-worker/stranger on the bus, for I have miscommunicated. It's been a day or two since my last effective communication.I could blame Mercury retrograde for all this, but that would skip over the learning, so I won't.
And, Ta-Da!, May 21. I wanted an image with flourish and this seems to capture the punctuation and celebration of this moment. Really, I'm impressed with myself that I managed to do a tile a day for a whole year - we went to D.C. once, PA twice, Tucson once, Denver once, mountain cabins, and various other over nights (hell, the whole project started while we were in Chicago), but I still managed to do the daily tile - and only gave one bottle of Mod Podge to airport security when I forgot to pack the Virgen supplies in my checked bag.Okay - time to pack and wrap this up. I find it curious that, without intent, we ended up going to the Pacific northwest at this time anyway. This trip started with a Mary Oliver reading in Seattle and built out from there, to scoop up my partner's birthday on May 23rd, a national holiday, and some excellent exploring. I wonder if we are supposed to be in that area at this time and will be curious to see if something extra profound occurs while we're there. If I was a friend of mine, I might say, "Mark my words", but am not certain that fate has a hand in this, so will remain curious and report back when we return.
You can look forward to that report and the next manifestation of these on June 1, when we're back from our 10 blissful days of Seattle/San Juans and Mary Oliver poetry. Life is good.
Here's to that. Here's to intention manifested, here's to vacation, and here's to art, however you define that.
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