November 4, 2009

Grooves in the Desert


I have been studying rugs lately...on gutenburg.  In this book on rugs it said this.
"The rug itself symbolizes Eternity and Space, and the filling or plan is the symbol of the world - beautiful but fleeting and limited."  Because that is what a life is and what we put in it and what we take out of it...just like what we decide to put in our art and what we leave out.  It is our story.

I think that this is what the Dug Out quilt has become for me.  It was just a UFO project. ..Now it has become a metaphor of the emotional desert that I have felt like I have been surviving in for a long time, (not all parts of my life...just a parent relationship).  I am beginning to see where I am and pick out the meaning of this place.  This quilt is still revealing things to me...and it is kinda amazing to be able to "see".



 The wind for me is all the things that my parents/elders said to me.  Some of it was good and some of it was to control me to their liking.  These ways of relating to me cut grooves in me and as a result created paths of thinking.   I had to rethink and reevaluate these paths so that I could develop my own response or learn to behave responsibly.  I know that it is a life long journey...learning what to keep and learning what to let go of.

  I have heard that a habit is a groove in the mind that is traveled over and over.  To break a habit you must traverse a different way.  You must create new grooves.  If you don't want the soil to erode from the wind in the desert you will have to set up barriers or grow things in the dirt.  You have to be proactive.  You must challenge the chaos and create order.


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