Blank Canvas

Life went a bit cray-cray on me at the end of May and in one afternoon I found myself no longer under contract on my dream home and no longer in my long term (seven year) relationship. May 24th, to be exact. Since then I bought a house and was laid off from my job, the latter not nearly as terrifying right now as it sounds.

Fast forward to now, mid-ish July, and I have a new dog, Perseus:



A new house:



A new life:

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Truth is, I'm learning to love it. Right now, I'm still unsure of its intentions.

I've never met anyone who was given such a bold opportunity to forge a new life, and it's one largest mixed-bag-of-emotions situations I've ever been in. Good, bad, ugly, all of the above, at the same time.

In art school the first thing you learn is the terrifying nature of a blank canvas. That first mark is so very, very special; it starts the process and sets up the nature of the piece. Many, many pieces met their demise soon after the first mark, and I'm feeling much like I do when I stand in front of a blank canvas. Metaphorically, this new life/place I'm in is the largest fucking canvas I've ever been in front of, and it is pristine; not a mark, not a blemish, nothing to break the tension. I've seen artists spend HOURS pacing in front of their new, perfectly white pieces. Shit, I've spent DAYS debating that first mark.

My first drawing professor told us his trick: "paint the canvas the most horrid color you can imagine, and I guarantee you'll want to put that mark down quick!" I started painting my canvases pink. This really pukie pink, not fit for anything but a gynecologist's office and it made me dry heave. I had to cover it up quickly.

Of course I can't actually paint my life a horrid color to turn the tension into something comical. However, I can feel as though I'm getting to the stage where I'm becoming annoyed with my own inaction.

That's just as good as the pukie-gyno-vagina pink I used to motivate myself in the past, because being pitiful and sedentary makes me want to dry heave too.