being that i am the queen of the eleventh hour, i did everything i possibly could to put off working on this piece. mostly because i didn't have a fully formed idea of it in my head. when it came down to the wire, i set about looking for already drawn birds to save a bit of time, and i came across an envelope full of papers from my previous residence; my grandfather's condo. i moved in during the fall of 2003 just after my great-grandmother died at 100, one of my best friends and i parted ways, and my grandfather was moved to hospice care with terminal cancer. i lived there until fall of 2005. that time was a dark one for me. prior to living there i was in temporary residence with said close friend after moving out of my then boyfriend's house in a hurry. i arrived with all of my belongings from storage to the place where my grandfather lived for 25 years or so, and all of it's contents. he didn't prepare to leave; everything was left intact from the day he went into the hospital. food in the refrigerator, laundry everything that one aquires over their lifetime. needless to say it was an interesting couple of years there. having to sort through his life and mine in the form of possessions was a weighty task; one that taught me a good lot of lessons, making me re-evaluate everything.
at the time, i would post open lettres on my refrigerator. it helped me work through what i needed to work through and let go of. i remember a friend standing and looking at one of the lettres in horror. i had forgotten about it, it was jsut another piece of paper collected on my refrigerator. looking at these lettres on sunday (when i finally got around to making the piece), the thing that most struck me is that i have no idea who i wrote these lettres to. i could narrow it down, they could apply to so many relationships i had. it strikes me that people really had no idea what i was going through at the time. it was a sign to me that i had managed to work through so many things.
come to the show:
opening salon style show FIRST FRIDAY 7 september 2007 6p - 1a
534 se oak street (at grand and 6th) in portland, or
as usual, i will be upstairs selling my wares with special guest vendor io herbal alchemy and usual suspects: brent wear, faith hats and jody kucinski
