In Honor of Sister Audre...International Women's Day 2015

"When I dare to be powerful - to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid." -Audre Lorde

 "The  fact that we are here and that I speak these words is an attempt to break that silence and bridge some of those differences between us, for it is not difference which immobilizes us, but silence. And there are so many silences to be broken."- Audre Lorde , The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action

"I write for those women who do not speak, for those who do not have a voice because they were so terrified, because we are taught to respect fear more than ourselves. We've been taught that silence would save us, but it won't." -Audre Lorde

 “The language by which we have been taught to dismiss ourselves and our feelings as suspect is the same language we use to dismiss and suspect each other.” -Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider

"You cannot, you cannot use someone else’s fire. You can only use your own. And in order to do that, you must first be willing to believe that you have it.”-I Am Your Sister: Collected and Unpublished Writings of Audre Lorde

 "For we have been socialized to respect fear more than our own needs for language and definition, and while we wait in silence for that final luxury of fearlessness, the weight of that silence will choke us." -Audre Lorde

“The strongest lesson I can teach my son is the same lesson I teach my daughter: how to be who he wishes to be for himself. And the best way I can do this is to be who I am and hope that he will learn from this not how to be me, which is not possible, but how to be himself. And this means how to move to that voice from within himself, rather than to those raucous, persuasive, or threatening voices from outside, pressuring him to be what the world wants him to be.” -Man Child: A Black Lesbian Feminist’s Response, -Audre Lorde

 “To search for power within myself means I must be willing to move through being afraid to whatever lies beyond.”-Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider

 "I am my best work-a series of road maps, reports, doodles and prayers from the front lines."              -Audre Lorde


I remember the very first time I came across Audre Lorde's writings...I was 19 years old, sitting in my Women Studies class...when I first started reading her words. They saved my life!! Her writings literally saved my life!! There I was, a very broken girl pretending to be not broken. There I was floundering and flailing...so very wounded and unsure of myself. There I was...an emotional holocaust. I had survived my extremely abusive and toxic childhood and "family" of origin...and running survival programs that traumatized children have to. I ended up taking my first Women Studies class by accident...just because the Psychology class I really wanted to take was full and this just happened to fit into my schedule kind of thing. But it was her writings that gave me strength and fuel...fire!! I held on for dear life to her words because they were my lifeline to a different world...a world where I could be self determining, a world where my gender would not oppress me and stifle me and put me in a box so tight I couldn't breathe. A world where I was not defined by abuse and trauma. Because she defined herself from divergent perspectives ..."a black feminist lesbian mother poet" is how she described herself...she gave me a way to do that myself. My identity could encompass all of my experiences...I didn't have to be defined by what made others feels safe and comfortable...I could contain multitudes.  I could speak my truth even though I was deeply afraid. Her writings gave me wings and hope; a road map to my own innate power. Her work literally saved me, loved me, empowered me and lit a light within me. How I devoured her writings throughout my life from that day on...memorized parts of her books and tucked them away in my heart...to be used as a soothing balm...over and over and over again.
With honor and deepest respect...dear Sister Audre...thank you!  
 International Women's Day 2015...lets make it happen!!

storytelling from the soul, a dream come true and the story behind it

I am so giddy with excitement to share with you that my art is on the cover of the current Art Journaling magazine!!! Can I say that this is an absolute dream come true? That my heart is overflowing with gratitude? That I started crying when I actually saw the cover? (is that silly??) That Tim and Tara are so so proud of me that it makes me crazy happy?
And can I share the back story of how this all happened?
Last summer I was going through a creative rut...stuck and stuck and then stuck some more. So I decided to take a short break from painting and immersed myself in reading and writing. One of the books I re-read was an all time fave.of mine called "Sister Outsider" by Audre Lorde. I hadn't read it since my 1st year in university (a gazillion years ago BTW!!) and everything she said resonated with me just as much as it had all that time ago ( maybe more so!). Her work gave me strength and clarity that I could then apply to my own work; what a gift!  I read, I cried, I wrote, I read some more...I cried some more. I had little stickies pasted everywhere...because if you've ever read Audre you know that everything she says is a quote!!

                                                       (a page from my Outsider Journals)
Truth: All my life I have been an outsider...to my "family" of origin, my culture and society. I just didn't fit in anywhere. It has been  a deeply painful experience...isolating and full of shame. All the trying to fit in but it never happening. All the "what if's" and ostracism. But there have been innumerable gifts that have come with it. So while re-reading Sister Outsider, I had an aha! moment. What if I not only embrace my outsider-ness but celebrate it as well???
This quote right here:
"Those of us who stand outside the circle of this society’s definition of acceptable women; those of us who have been forged in the crucibles of difference ... know that survival is not an academic skill. It is learning how to stand alone, unpopular and sometimes reviled, and how to make common cause with those others identified as outside the structures in order to define and seek a world in which we can all flourish. It is learning how to take our differences and make them strengths."
                              -The Master's Tools will Never Dismantle the Master's House, by Audre Lorde from Sister Outsider
...inspired my entire journal called the Outsider Journals.  

I went back to my art excited and inspired! I felt that each page in my journal gathered up entire pieces of my life, struggles and journey and i poured out my heart and soul. Creating the journal was cathartic and life changing and because it was private, I felt so free to allow all of mySELF and the deepest parts of my soul to shine through ! After I completed the journal I thought I could someday pass it along to Tara; it would be a road map of sorts that might inspire her to forge her own path.

Then one day we were at the bookstore and I picked up a copy of  Art Journaling mag and started reading it; my heart started racing, let me just tell you! What if I sent in my (very personal, very private) Outsider Journals ???). Eeek! Do I dare? I went back and forth, back and forth and all of my deepest darkest fears came up to the surface. What if they laughed at me? what if  I'm not really an artist? not a real one, anyway? what if I made a complete fool of myself? On and on...and on and on. 

                                                       (self portrait -Jan, 2013,  44 years young)
And then I took a big huge breath ...and knew in my heart that I deeply believe in my art and my work and I allowed that to guide me. All the things I write about on my blog that I deeply deeply believe with all of my heart + soul...( cultivating courage, I am enough, being vulnerable, being seen etc)...well, I had to put them into practice now (so so difficult) and get out of my own way!  I also know that not fitting in is an archetypal experience that most of us experience at some time or another. And the paradox of it is that we all feel so isolated in our shame that we either negate it or  never stop trying to fit in. I felt that maybe there would be other souls who could see themSELVES in my experience and so...I sent off my journal and let go...of all expectations and fears.

And that's how I came to have  6 full pages in the magazine ("Storytelling from the Soul" pg. 54) and my art on the cover as well!! Thank you so much Somerset Studio, Amber Demien and all the staff at Stampington & Company...for giving me this amazing opportunity. Thank you a hundred times over! You all have made one 44 year old woman feel like a teenager with a crush...soul full of stars + stomach full of  butterflies... leaping!  My heart is full.

"sister outsider"

"What are the words you do not yet have? What do you need to say? What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own?, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence? Perhaps for some of you here today, I am the face of your fears. Because I am a woman, because I am Black, because I am lesbian, because I am myself-a Black woman warrior poet doing my work-come to ask you...are you doing yours?" -Audre Lorde

In the first year of university my minor was psychology...by default. I just thought I should go into it because I had absolutely no idea what I wanted to do. I happened to take an entry level Women Studies class because it fit into my schedule...and ...I fell in love!!! Deeply + madly and head over heels. It was instant. I loved the alternate views, the passion, the closely looking at how we construct knowledge.

So...I changed my minor and started taking all sorts of Feminist classes that interested me. But...here's the thing...I studied all of the "classics" from the 2nd wave of feminism (Greer, Steinem, Friedan etc)...and I didn't see mySELF!!! There was an exclusion of women of color that was absolute and pervasive. Throughout my life, I have always felt an outsider...always at the edge...and now here I was again!!!

"I have a duty to speak the truth as I see it and to share not just my triumphs, not just the things that feel good, but the pain, the intense, often unmitigating pain...If what I have to say is wrong, then there will be some woman who will stand up and say Audre Lorde was in error. But my words will be there." -Audre Lorde

So...when I stumbled upon dear soul sister Audrey Lorde...I instantly connected with her on so many levels. I voraciously sought out all of her books and papers and devoured them...it was like a light went on in my in my mind and my soul lit up...I had come home!!! Here was a woman who was unafraid to be herSELF and she threw a lifeline out to those of us who needed it; showing us the way. Not to become like her...but a far greater gift...to become ourSELVES. She created a more inclusive feminism that I could relate to. When I discovered her works...I could breathe!

(a page from my "Outsider Journals"

"Ultimately it comes down to making yourself and the people who can share it with you, in some way, more themselves, to make you more yourself, to make human beings more themselves, and therefore, by extension, better, stronger, more real. Isn't this the function of all art? I mean, get out of the Western Bag, out of "art for arts' sake", out of the perfect circle. A perfect circle is a point. It does not move at all. It's stationary. Let's get out of that. The function of any art is to move, more deeply, to make us more of who we are." -Audre Lorde

Now that I am rereading her works...so many years later...I see things with a new + fresh perspective especially as it applies to my work. Reading "Sister Outsider" gives me strength and inspiration...a new epistemology; "kitchen table politics". I have been working on a journal called "Outsider Journals" ...where I am claiming and celebrating my outsider-ness. It is difficult and painful, there is no denying that, but it has so many gifts to offer. I see that more clearly every single day. To create from the edge...to walk that line of fitting in/not fitting in...leads us to find out true voice.