Possibilities:  Love What You See, watercolor and pen art by Tammy Vitale, matted print $20 (8"x10"outside), by Tammy Vitale

I’m playing with potential, with possibilities, with paint and ink and $80 worth of new pens and paper and some amount of old crayons and sooner or later, old pastels (really old – I’ve had them since I was 26 which tells you how much pastel work I do.  And I gave away a whole new set to a friend about 10 years ago.)

This Possibilities is a "you" but I did the same one (different picture) with "I" and it really changes the way you ready it.  I think I like first person better.  What do you think?  (I’d show you the "I" one, but I can’t seem to find it – how can is get lost in less than 24 hours?).

There were other forays into this new project, but mostly puttering at this point.  The, ahem, possibility is there for them to move forward, but that hasn’t been recognized yet.  I think I will let them turn into my morning pages.  But of course today is Sunday and that means I get to sit and read the Sunday paper.  I kept Gracie on leash next to me because she wouldn’t pee outside this morning, and we just had a 3rd and finally successful foray out to pee.  I realize I’m probably going to have to do that around pooping too.

Then, since I was on a creative roll, I rolled right into the studio and worked an entire 25 pound bag of clay into new work – down to the scraps which I made into jewelry pieces (maybe – we’ll see how they hold up – but the idea is fire them and them paint them with this great iridescent acrylic paint I have).  Good thing – it had opened when I took the first bag out of the box and was drying, which actually made it really good for working with my new stamps.   When clay is really wet, it sucks onto the stamps and that results in blurred lines, so this all worked out great!  Am making some new "prose" tiles, as opposed to word tiles since I have sayings on them and they’re a bit larger than the word tiles.  The word tiles retail for $18 (3" x 5") and the prose tiles will retail for $22 (4" x 6").  When I’m in the right mood, I really like making both of these because I now have quite the catalog of stamps and I get to play with designs to my hearts content.

Son checked in and has had a very good week.  In one of his groups, a guy who had picked up a djembe (drum) at a thrift store and failed to be able to play it, brought it to a Friday night gathering where Son played his little heart out.  So the guy gave it to him (Son used to have 2 of his own but they got lost, along with a lot of other stuff, along the way).  Just like that.  Son is beside himself and now spends some time in the park across from his dorm playing the drum.  He also had a most excellent guided meditation this week.  He sounds so good!  He sounds happy!  I remain most hopeful.

AND I made it onto the final level of level 2 of Luxor.  It was a very good day.

thought for the day:  As Erickson found in his research, sorting, stacking and organizing are natural for children.  It’s play.  And play for them is really a learning experience.  They integrate inner dilemmas, teach themselves speech, orient themselves to new visual and aural patterns, all through play.  This is the way children learn how to be in the world.  As we become older and more involved in formal education, we close our connection to this way of being, and with it go the excitement, enthusiasm, and freshness of childhood.  When you are an artist, you can again see the world with the eyes of the child – with the ‘beginner’s eyes’ and ‘beginner’s mind.’  Nancy Azara, Spirit Taking Form:  Making a Spiritual Practice of Making Art