katherine, carey and charles tucker (and me) New Year 2009

A New Year, a renewal, a re-beginning...

Here's a post for anyone who wants to know how our New Year's (and Christmas) went.

It was a quiet affair. We spent Christmas alone. Carey went down to visit his mother. Chuck gave me beautiful artist-made jewelry - a necklace and a bracelet. The necklace is wonderful because it actually matches some earrings he gave me a few years ago. It (the necklace) has yellow heart-shaped crystals and an iridescent glass center-piece. We had some wine, a little cheese... all in front of our "charlie brown" Christmas tree.

Carey came back in time for New Year's and Katherine flew in with him. I actually had pies baking in the oven for them. (For those of you unfamiliar, Chuck has three really amazing off-spring, Christopher, Carey and Katherine. Being able to share in their lives is the greatest generosity anyone has ever shown me. Thanks to Chuck and also thanks to their mom Karen.) Chris wasn't able to make it in I'm afraid. We re-did Christmas with them and then watched movies together for New Year's Eve. We had one disruption that evening but by mid-night everything had settled down and we toasted one another with asti-spumante... super sweet. The hillbilly in me loves it.

According to tradition (at least where we come from), what you do New Year's Day sets the course for the rest of the year. Eating greens brings money; eating black-eyed peas brings luck (the eyes i think); and a ham hock brings wealth. I made us all of the above plus a chicken. If I say so myself it was a great meal.

Chuck has spent the holiday keeping us in fires and we've worked on the house I bought for us to use as a studio. The cats have lounged and enjoyed everyone being home and the extra attention. All in all ... it was better than last year ... what could be better than being surrounded by those you love.

I hope everyone else had a wonderful holiday and that the New Year brings us peace and some contentment. With LOVE to you all. You're in my thoughts.

The pictures are from New Year's Eve and actually today, except for the one of Chuck and Katherine, which is from Thanksgiving at Chuck's parents.

speaking the name of god...

This year… or year and a half, has been about assessment - assessing my life… trying to find reason to it. I have not given you, the ether, a report on my condition, as of late – Let me summarize by saying it has been a year of loss and challenge… beginning with the Summer of 2007 I learned that my cancer had begun to grow again and it required a fourth surgery to remove five tumors. Not long after, on Thanksgiving of 2007 my mother died… I won’t go into details. Then on December 17th 2007, I had my fourth cancer surgery with Chuck by my side. In the Spring of 2008 I was deeply depressed and grieving. I received good news though in March… my cancer was, for the first time ever, below any detectable levels. The first time a possibility of a cure has ever been seriously mentioned in the twelve years of fighting it. Chuck went to Banff to make work. I went to New York to heal and do the same. During that time my personal life underwent an unexpected change and again I found myself living with uncertainty and grief. This time has caused me to look inward and once again take an accounting… make an assessment of the things I value and what choices should be precipitated through this evaluation.

More recently someone described to me his current existential crisis. It reminded me of my own major journey into that darkness in 1996 when I was first diagnosed with cancer. All I could see then was a black infinity… and nothing… “a million years from now is only 30 seconds away” was my most conscious and persistent thought. What did anything mean? How was there any purpose to the things I was doing? I would sit in the class I was teaching and stare at the floor… It was all-pointless… meaningless. I carried with me an anger for humanity’s stupidity. I remember someone telling me they believed me an angry feminist and who hated all men. They didn’t understand… I was just angry that life had lost its flavor.

Slowly I began to climb out from that darkness. It was a place where I had just been barely clinging to the walls. As part of that climb, I consciously chose that which would be important to me. I needed a system to determine the value of those “things.” I decided I to develop a “metaphysical” frame … That system began with: Lane ends when Lane ends -- but there is an interconnectedness among people. I am part. You are part. This is my god. What I say and do now telegraphs to the future… It is carried forward like the mutation in mitochondrial DNA – a marker influencing future thought. My individuality may no longer exist, but my thought, and to some degree my mind, continues in that it is embedded in any thought, any life, which contains a residue of my thinking. Each of us has influence on others in this way. It is both conversely rhizomatic and linear.

As a consequence of this understanding of meaning and its transmission to the future and conceivably infinity, I began to become more aware of the individual’s responsibility for signification … First I became aware of it in my work as an artist, and then in my life “acts” and how I impact others. This understanding of things gradually gained influence over my life and my thinking. It now provides a foundation of logic as to how I make decisions; choices; etc. It is an ethic that I apply with lesser and greater consistency depending on my own clarity and personal discipline. It guides me and provides a measure for the choices I make. As a result there are times and choices I regret.

There are those I know, well respect and love who believe that to regret is waste… but I understand regret as a kind of grief – an acknowledgement of a loss due sometimes to mistakes or perhaps failed choices … and it is only through loss, the experience of grief, that the full value of “things” can become clear against a non-hierarchal background. Sometimes that loss may be as simples as a particular sense of the self.

Valuing and evaluating my enacting of signification with a recognition that all signification is transmitted to the larger culture allows me to determine if I am “saying” what I mean, … being who I want to imagine myself to be… rather than intuitively creating myself – this process of measure and the taking of responsibility allows me to actively and consciously … with an awake mind … create myself.

love's labors lost...

Sometimes things are beyond your control... What am I to learn from this the past year? It seems there must be something... some task I've set for myself; some betterment of my greater person...

Let go and accept... let go.

A cat is a cat... not a person... no greater or lesser than any other animal... but my true and loyal companion... the one who made me the center... She fed me and now... even this... In the scope of things, surely not the greatest loss of my year -- but what a comfort she's been to me. I hope I was right daddy... I hope there is a heaven for kitties.

let go...

zoe, lucy's step-daughter is on the left; lucy is on the right. I'm such a sap... please send some good thoughts my way.

coming soon...

I've been away (mentally at least) -- new posts coming soon

lucy ii needs a home...

My mother is moving into an assisted living home... My dad's cat, Lucy (named after my lucy) needs a home... If you know a kind person who loves animals and who would be willing to take her ... please let me know. I would take her but I have three cats and William, my seventeen year old, is still angry and peeing on things because of the addition of Sam.

It is very important to me that Lucy ii finds a good home ... she was with my dad when he died.

snow... snow... snow...

more snow than i've ever seen... these pics are from February 13... I kept thinking the lens was getting wet... alas not... it was the flash hitting the "blizzard like conditions"... I never thought I would ever see so much snow... Carey and I decided to go out and play ... Then Valentine's Day Chuck, Carey and I, and the rest of Cleveland spent the day trying to dig out...

baby it's cold...

(My post from Myspace...)

It's a balmy 5 degrees here right now... The low tonight -1...

I never knew cold before. Thank God I have my soviet era German military coat to keep me warm... best thing my second ex-husband ever did for me.

and so it goes...

in other news...

I'm working on a new attitude via neuro-plasticity... I'll let you know how my transformation goes...

Last night step-nephew Carey and I went to see Pan's Labryinth...

Horrific and brillant... It took hours for my mental equlibrium to come back to plane...
We had to watch Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy to adjust...

Just now Carey and I are spending a lot of time together... in that he's run into... err... shall we say... difficulty at school...

Step-Aunting can be so difficult.

and so i hurl this note into the void with wishes of peace and love...

christmas '06

Well... it didn't snow... and there were boxes everywhere from the move but Christmas, despite all the stress from trying to finally get in the house... was great! We missed Chris and there were others we would have spent time with but Katherine and Carey made the holidays.

The kitties, of course, participated and Sam was slightly more social than usual. (Samalina is black and white... William is all white... Lucy, not pictured, is orange and white.) Lots of good presents... I got earrings, candles, pajamas, movies... Katherine and Carey both got lots of clothes and Chuck got a movie, cookbook, house shoes and a Joseph Campbell book he read in two days.

I was a little sad not having everyone in the same place... It's always difficult with us being in Cleveland and everyone else being in Alabama, Mississippi and North Carolina... but all in all, I think it was pretty wonderful... Our first Christmas in the house.

wheels keep on turning...

So Sunday we headed south (sorry everyone that I wasn't able to visit)... Cleveland to Birmingham on Sunday... then to Tuscaloosa where Chuck and Carey loaded a Uhaul to take back to Cleveland... Christopher met us to help load and carry... and then I went on to Jackson to stay with mother while Kathy and her family went skiing. Chuck and Carey are currently enroute to Cleveland. (Hope they're careful!)

That's Ms. Traina-Gams with the dogs. Mr. Gams with their tree. Carey and Chris at the Waffle House. I haven't had eggs that good (unless we cooked them at home) since I don't know when.

The BMW is my niece's :-)... Oh I'm so envious!!! I thought it made a funny comparison to my sweet and sassy '99 Saturn.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday!

snow and lucy...

For all my bama babes... Snow in the great white north...

I'm thinking of you all and missing you.

meatloaf last night...

Over the years I've had the great joy of having some amazing people as students. They are wonderful and this year's crop is no different. I won't lie to you... from time to time you have the student that you know isn't ready to "be here," but for the most part -- I've been granted a great gift... an incredible gift... my students truly are a joy...

Last night my second years had a closing reception for their show "meatloaf." It was incredible... Their invitations were beautiful, the food was well thoughtout and delicious, they had a documentary video interviewing each of them concerning their work, and speaking of work... it was pretty damn good. They curated themselves and installed it. The publicity was obviously successful... the turnout was huge.

I sound like ... a dolt... but I mean it... I'm so impressed with them. I can't wait to see their futures...

Congratulations guys on a great show!

i took tons of pictures... here are just a few.

show info:

meatloaf. works by fourteen area artists
nov 27 to dec 2
Cleveland Institute of Art Coffeehouse Gallery

Featured Artists:
alicia oblander
patrick mooney
carolyn shank
michael meier
jon sommer
martin eisert
peter tabor
angelo nicoletti
rebekah wilhelm
barbara polster
melinda laszcynski
rachel allen
christa drew
andrew kuhar

still shouting and other holiday thoughts...

a house of the present... a house of the past...

---

... so yeah... double thanks to Laura and Andy again... especially after they brought down leftovers for dinner tonight...

love to...

Emily and Todd...
Anna and Mike...
Everyone in Florence, including Kritter...

---
now for the other thoughts...

nostalgia - a longing for a perceived past

holidays invoke the reconstructed past...

I'm working on a project that might be good...

we'll see...

Thanksgiving shout out...

I'm Thankful for the people who love me...

My family... (mother of course)... Chuck, Carey, Ms. Traina and Mr. Gams, Joy...

the folks upstairs (Laura and Andy) -- thanks for the delicious Thanksgiving... I'll never wear pants again that fit...

Kristen, Amanda...Ben... Hey Yianni too... Adam (I'm thinking of you!)... Alicia... Duane... David... Charisse...

My cousins... Chris S. especially...

Liberal Arts Folks...

Thanks Rita for all the support...

Whoever hired me!!!

Oh hey, that includes Phillip... thanks Phillip for everything you've done for me.

and fur people too...

so loved...

William, Sam, and Lucy...
Abby and Stella...
All the Traina/Gams monsters...

I LOVE YOU ALL!!!

the fall...

The year has begun again in earnest... A whole new group of students... new faces, new names and how quickly I fall in love with them.

For all of them I want success -- I envision happiness for their futures and allow myself to imagine I might have played a part. The other night at the faculty opening I stood on a balconey overlooking the crowd and (after I wrestled down the desire to sing "Don't Cry for Me Argentina...") I was washed over with... gasp... love for all these people. Sick and romantic isn't it?

In other news I'm sewing... hey I think I would like to start a church of craft... and I'm cycling (at least sometimes)... It is very calming. It's a solitary exercise of sorts and I can actually do it. (Thanks Andy for putting the bike back together.)

goodbye Roscoe...

Roscoe was our next door neighbor's cat. He was scrapy, a fighter. Our cat William and Roscoe tangled more than once. I think it was actually fun for the two of them and they never did horrible damage to one another. (Although William did claw Roscoe's owner once...)

Roscoe was part of our lives. We looked forward to seeing him in the evenings sitting on his stoop. His family kept a little "Wanted" poster of him on their door. His owner... the family's teenage son adored him.

Roscoe died of wounds from a dog attack. The dog wasn't on a lesh and was roaming free. Some would say I have a double standard about such things... cats... allowed to roam free... dogs... no.

Reasoning: Cats don't usually attack people (children for instance) and when they do it's rarely fatal. Even when they fight with other cats, that too, while more frequently fatal is usually not.

I prefer to keep my own cats in but two of them are rescues and were already trained to go in and out.


Anyway... Roscoe's death makes me very sad. I feel sorry for his family and I'm going to miss him.

absolutely potty...

Those who know me know that I am one of the geeks... the sad horrible geeks who love the escapism of the Harry Potter books. They sooo satisfy my inner child. So indulge me while I indulge myself and if you happen to be a Potter fan forgive me and you may not want to read the following no matter who you are...

(book 6 spoiler warning...)

Theories on Harry Potter, Book 7

Dumbledore is dead. He knew he was going to die and arranged it with Snape.
Snape is a good guy. He is trying to protect Draco who he feels some compassion/connection with. Dumbledore, as well, was interested in protecting Draco in that Draco is a naïf, in over his head.

Harry is a horcrux. Part of Voldemort’s soul was unwittingly bound to him. Harry’s mother cast a protective spell that required a human sacrifice. She was the sacrifice and when Voldemort killed her it completed the charm. The magic was so strong that Voldemort couldn’t kill Harry and the killing charm he cast backfired and also made Harry the horcrux for the splinter of Voldemort’s soul that his mother’s murder created.

Harry is “the chosen one” in that Voldemort literally, and again unwittingly, chose him. It is why they share powers and are telepathically connected.

Aunt Petunia actually loves Harry. Uncle Vernon hates him but Petunia put up with his treatment of Harry because she knew their home was part of a protective spell for Harry. She was afraid Vernon would throw Harry out. She is also terrified of magic.

In the end, the final battle, Neville will be forced to kill Harry. Harry will ask Neville to do it. They will both realize it is the only way. It is the reason they share the same birthday.

Neville himself may not make it through… but then again he might and his parents may actually regain their faculties once Voldemort has been killed.

Ron and Hermione will face the future together after watching their friend die.

Some emotional relief for the readers? A glimpse perhaps of Harry’s afterlife? Will he be greeted by Sirius and his parents?

sleep...

A dreamless night in my own bed after time spent in the heat and in conversation... a visit with my mother who is stronger than I ever imagined then to see Ms. T and the monsters... a chance to laugh out loud... my mind washed clean by a southern sun... The summer is finally here for me...

I love you all...

a great sadness overtakes me...

to use and be used...

the momentary sensation replaces the human connection...

those who love you are an imposition...

is this the way you would live your life?


do you love more the pleasure you give yourself or the kindness you share with others? do you care what toll that pleasure takes on those around you?

what will be the meaning of your life?

who are you?

I thought I knew you but I don't. you're capable of things I never would have believed.

Sans compassion pour ton famille... Tu est cruel a les gens qui t'adorer... pour quoi? mais tu embrasse les gens du moment...

sans reason...

in answer to your question...

"will it stand...?" You bet. Here's the finished piece outside CIA's Future Center in the "courtyard"... When it stood, (not weakly, but very securely...) a case of beer was lost...

There are some much more stunning pictures of the piece... (the piece isn't crooked... the camera isn't level... my photography) however they keep loading sideways... I'm not as tech savy as I should be so I don't know how to fix it. I think eventually they'll be posted on CIA's website (www.cia.edu)

Assistants on the project included:

Benjamin Rodriguez, jr (benrodjr.com)
Katie Loesel
Derek Gelvin
Jeremy Felice

Search them on the web. I know that Katie, Ben and Slate have websites. (I hope I spelled Katie's last name right. Sometimes it helps to add "art" to the search.)

Again it was tremendous fun working with the young people. (I intentionally didn't include photos with them simply because this is a private blog.) They were so committed...!

what we did for summer vaction...

this past week Chuck, Kevin and I worked on the Cleveland Institute of Art's Precollege program. The theme this year was Art + Earth... We worked with a group of 24 really cool young people... who, to a great extent... really threw themselves into the project that the program was based on and also spent time on drawing, etc. The youngest was a very mature fourteen year-old and the oldest was a nineteen year-old deeply devoted to drawing...

While other things not so fun were going on in our private life,...

Working with the young people in this program was very satisfying... It was great to see their committment and accom-plishments.

The project was a cast/rammed earth project that the students designed and built with help from great folks like Derek, Slate, and Jeremy... They worked their butts off... Katie (who you see in some of the pictures) helped me with the drawing part of the program.

Posted photos are of in progress work...More photos of the actual finished piece are to come...