Bear with me heart as I ache...

Time flowing in an orbit all its own. Last week we received word of my little 2 yr. old cousin Mason's accidental drowning in his backyard pool. My heart threw itself into a panic as I tried and still try to comprehend the reality of this meaning. The silent whisper of why floats by and forces me to stand firm on the ground of rooting in the moment. How can we not, pulling along our fragile skin with lives balanced in an obtuse world? All is transient. All is passing. When- how- why? Eyes on the Eternal, I think about this thing called mortality and lay stripped, feeling like I need warm rain to fall on me and turn the soil of my being into a moist clay--able to be shaped into whatever it is called to--whatever it is named.

Love. Poured forth. Needing the cup to catch every drop. How to live life to the fullest? How to live love without obstacles? Caring for little lives that depend on us to show the way, to carve a mark on the heart--this is the easiest most beautiful and natural thing to do in the world and also the most difficult with the weight of life and the sin of the world and the ever-present reality of our bodily limits. How do we do it? How can we capture some of that love and place it in a jar to behold, as small children stare in awe as with fireflies caught? To summon beauty and truth forth and find a way even in the most simple and ordinary places to allow them to illuminate life, casting back the dark of the night. Casting back the wages of sin. Light. Light. Light. Time moving forward with deep undercurrents racing back in the gesture ahead. We can love. More. Now.

Aaron found this quote that put it in its place-- the unknowing of death...

"To fear death, my friends, is only to think ourselves wise, without being wise: for it is to think that we know what we do not know. For anything that men can tell, death may be the greatest good that can happen to them: but they fear it as if they knew quite well that it was the greatest of evils. And what is this but that shameful ignorance of thinking that we know what we do not know?" - Socrates

I had to make a painting of Mason. No way to travel the whole of us there, and yet aching with grief. No way to imagine the pain felt in the loss for Jen and Paul. And yet it can happen to any of us, any time. It made sense to me why the human inclination is to depict the loved especially if they have passed. And photographs that suspend time cannot do this the way the hand can mystically transport out of time, beyond time. I am still in awe of the process of forming image--especially in human depiction. What is it to paint with love if we want to live with love? What is passion in our creative outlays of pursuit? It is all love from beginning to end.

And the halo came so easily, so quick...

I am going to pray now. Little night breath steadily blowing in and out. Life. Beautiful little lives gifted for a time together here, then eternity there. Now. Steady. Breath movement as in a linear line moving through time. Peace. My children. God's children.

And again love...

Onwards and new things...

So here is a replacement photo of my finished St. George slaying the dragon being that it is the first that truly feels complete (and totally made without my dear mentor Ksenia around). I am excited to dive in to the next which are two resurrection icons along with more miniatures of the Holy Face. This is good.

Today I will meet with Father Andrew of Holy Resurrection Orthodox Church in Claremont about doing a week-long workshop for a group in August in Keene. This meeting coincides with my first experience of an Orthodox service. Needless to say, I am of little words today, feeling very much excited for this initial opening. Praying for my heart that my excitement can remain in check.

It is indeed good. And all shall be well....

Interior renovation

I have been wanting to share this image for awhile. I find it strangely provocative and a bit pictorially symbolic of the healing needed in one's spiritual life. I speak of myself. Broken, sometimes feeling like caving in, but still resounding of mystery and the ability to enter in and make beautiful.

How is it that time slips so quickly through the cycles of life? Lent again. Denial of self and gifting of self--trying to break old patterns and make strong and new. I can open that door to the Spirit to rework. O interior castle may there not be too many layers of grime to wash clean...

All I want is to have vibrant love and live it out wholeheartedly. I am realizing my ignorance of theology, of philosophy, of life... What are the vestments of faith and how are they worn? Things I once accepted without questioning are being questioned. How to live? How to live that vibrant love? How do we dive deep into God and listen to all He has to say?

Two little ones to juggle along with the other three. Wanting to go into the studio, and yet wanting to gift little people with all the good things they need now with basic love and exploring life. So I opt for the love of the littles, to the littles and being in the moment with them. This is good. Realizing it is ok to want to write icons, but I don't do it for me. I want to grow in knowledge--in things of interior life. And learn how to live.

Finally I will go to an Orthodox service this week. I am more than excited with all that I have been reading and looking and already living out in prayer through the icon. We want to be in community. Where will this be? Change has to happen.

Kiss the icon--and enter in.

Why are lessons so hard sometimes?

Today I am writing in frustration. Too little time and then unforseen forces leading to accidental circumstance. One of our cats has scratched two of my icons and then sent my pigments flying into powdered puddles on the floor. Basically wounds and dust. I am trying to see a lesson amidst this feeling of angst. Trying to let it float off me instead of weighing down. Help.

I miss Ksenia. I want to find that rhythm that leads their days. Paced, slow, meditative, timeless. The shape of time is different in the here and now, and I know that, but feeling the need to place that blueprint within to fit when the time is right. Interior survival.

All I hear is Soren's breath, these keys being typed, the windchimes outside, and the tick of the clock. Good sounds. Oh to go crack an egg!

Here are some images (not a very good ones) of Ksenia's studio and some icons up. Visual reference points. Encouragement. May my brush not be hasty, and my patience not be short.

I am bathed in this most wonderful sense of being gazing upon her icons: the smell hits me, the beautiful mystery and familiarity, the reassurance of history. I put my hope in what lies ahead--obviously in the ultimate beginning, but also in release from days of being a novice when I will wield a confident brush. Those days will come.

New babe and the door of winter yet to open...

It has been months. Time rolling by as my pregnancy built. No words passed by this zone in the build to new life--I stretched and encompassed the little growing Soren within me. And now here he is, gently breathing asleep on my chest as little Emma collects paper clips on the floor, busily making piles and singing as she goes. It is amazing to ponder the enormity of life change possible in several seasons passing...
And so now I slowly pull together the shape of life in this time. Two little people totally dependent on me (not to mention the three older ones), and a significant desire if not insatiable need to continue to hone the skills in becoming the iconographer that calls to me. How to do this? To take what little time belonging to me (in napping times of the little ones) to enter that space.
And here comes winter as we round the corner of Thanksgiving next week.
I jumped back into writing the face of Christ the other day feeling out of sorts--not truly myself, missing and hungering to pray in that way. So I did. And Christ looked back at me for two hours as I lined his hair with raw umber as lovingly as I could and paved the way in pompeii red for the outline of the cloth from which his face looks out. A simple way to love I suppose, but the love gave back. And questions poured forth, and I know that I must continue to find whatever time I can to contemplate this place of simply being and being loved--a place where there is a semblance of understanding and being understood. And drawing forth to take with me upon leaving that time and space, so it is still with me. Like the Jesus prayer. To be able to pray without ceasing and to love continually.
I am excited about future plans for the Saints to come out of the door I write. Now I see the flaws of each past attempt, which actually encouraged me that I saw the growth and the struggle. Another reason it is so important to forge ahead and keep growing. To keep the eye discerning and seeing more--opening up to do the best it can in working with hand and heart.
So for now, the paperclips are played and little eyes upon me to move on.
But I will return to share pictures and images.

Cry not over me, Mother

"In my arms I hold thee as a corpse,
O Loving Lord,
who hast brought the dead to life;
grievously is my heart wounded
and I long to die with thee",
said the All-Pure,
"for I cannot bear to look upon Thee,
lifeless and without breath."

"Where, O my Son and God,
are the good tidings of the Annunciation
that Gabriel brought me?
He called Thee King and God
and Son of the Most High;
and now, O my sweet Light,
I behold Thee naked, wounded and lifeless."

"Release me from my agony and take me with Thee,
O my Son and God.
Let me also descend with Thee, O Master, into hell.
Leave me not to live alone,
for I cannot bear to look upon Thee,
my sweet Light."

--From the Good Friday Compline


Here we are, gazing through tears, at the foot of the cross bearing the extinguished body of Our Lord. Here the ultimate paradox in that the Creator, who descended from heaven and was born as man, allowed himself to be mocked, judged, tormented and killed by those he himself had created: "Today the Master of Creation stands before Pilate; today the maker of all things is given up to the cross. The Deliverer of the world is struck on the face, and the Creator of all is mocked by His own servants."
And the Sun disappeared. And the Earth shook.
"Holy Holy Holy!" cried the grieving cherubim and angels...

"And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself"
(Jn 12:32)

(*side note~ Kenosis: He has emptied his body by submitting to death, expressed by the open wounds in the hands and side. The redeeming quality of the water and blood that ran out of the wound in his side, is passed on by the sacraments of Baptism and the Holy Eucharist.)


I wrote this icon of The Man of Sorrows before working with Ksenia, with egg tempera for the corpus and encaustic paint in the background. Here I know nothing. I want so badly to express my love, but it still falls so short, so burdened with flaws... But laying it out, is like exposing one's sin. I will look forward to the day of re-doing it under her tutelage.

As for now we await the Ressurrection...

Washing feet and applying rabbit skin glue

We move steadily towards Good Friday, and it seems fitting that I sit here with drying tightening glue on my fingers after fixing cheesecloth to my birch panels for future icons. Time to dry, time to hold sleeping Emma, time to prepare the heart and spirit for our symbolic Passover seder approaching. And then perhaps later tonight, when the children are asleep, to apply the gesso or levkas to my board--many fluid layers building up to symbolically represent the uncreated Light of God upon which the icons will be written.

Why does this world lay such burdens at our feet? Why do we not press harder towards the goal? One wants to take the perfumed oil and pour it lovingly on the feet of Christ. To gaze upon the Face that knows what is to be suffered and anoints with boundless love. How to make each moment gifted for God, even when enfolded in the mundane, how to love the sinner and cast the sin back where it belongs, how to live a life ripe with fruits of God's grace--to shine with the transfigured light of our Lord? To not fall asleep or fall short of that which we are called... Deepen my interior prayer as I focus and settle upon the breathing in of Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, exhaling have mercy on me and on the whole world.

I want to be a better Christian.

More prayer. More sacrifice. More love.

Love--love the cleansing of dirty feet, love the gift of making visible the invisible in the process of writing icons, love the process of motherhood and gift of life within, love the sacramental marriage to the man I love who is such a gift to me. Love that I have been pulled across the chasm to a new land to help to build a New Jerusalem.

I am off now to put another coat of terra verte green with a touch of ultramarine to the background of my Theotokos. I am hoping to gracefully reinstate the lines of my drawing to make it as beautiful as possible. Last week I almost finished my Theotokos with Ksenia, and I am needing to practice it again. And again, and again and so on. Little by little we start to see and find the way.