21 Grams

Listening to longevity experts, the importance of being social seems to be even more important than exercise and a good diet.

 It would be interesting if they were to study the impact of creative making and interacting with nature as symbiotic ways of socializing along with human interaction.

 As both a creative maker and someone in tune with nature, I find it is necessary to be away from human interaction for sustained periods of time to “socialize” with that energy field which sits beyond the human familiar.  

 When I am in my studio, I am attempting to listen, honor and encourage my “soul” to communicate through me. This ego, named Eve, is aware that my awareness is not contained solely in the vessel of my physical form. My ego and my soul communicate with lively enthusiasm when we dissolve the reality barrier and solve puzzles by creating worlds in paint and paper.

 There is gleeful giddiness in this two-on-two communion. When things go haywire (which they do), it is my ego, straining for dominance, that clashes and destroys the cerebral moments and breaks the creative spell. Then I crash, burn, dust off, let go and reinvite my soul back into the game.

 Is it irony or purpose? My soul cannot create without my ego, yet to create, my ego must give my soul all the space and freedom she needs…she is the music, I am the sheet onto which the score is written.

 I spend a lot of time outside, breathing in sky, earth and air. I fall in love again and again, nurtured by all I can see, touch and feel. Physics has taught us we are combined miracles of particles and atoms, floating in contained forms which we visualize as ourselves and surroundings, from rock to cloud, ephemeral, yet dense, solid yet electrically loose.

 As we perceive these forms as stagnant, our atoms vibrate and bounce in a vocabulary of emotions with our surroundings. When I place my hand on the trunk of a tree, and my human warmth travels deep into the tunnels of her trunk, I feel that she feels my presence as I feel hers. Not separate from but embraced within a wonderous tapestry of everything.

footnote 1907 experiment by Duncan MacDougall, placing his consenting dying patients on a scale and noting at the moment their final exhale, they weighed 21 grams less.