Eve

I really miss bread today, for the phantom yet ubiquitous record. I want some with butter and honey seeping into it. There really is not a replacement. I am getting better though and recovering from my divorce with gluten, but that is not really relevant for today. Eve most definitely is.

This is Eve. On my comforter. She has been my constant companion and accountability for about three months now. Apparently, I can measure my life in art projects as I have been reduced to doing them at a ridiculously slow pace...especially given the simplicity surrounding her.

But the simplicity was important and needed to develop as it willed, carefully. So here she is. I still need to lacquer her or coat her with acrylic gel medium, that is for another pay check though. I think it is time to share her.

Eve is for my innumerable strong women who are living with circumstances and battles that they did not choose for themselves. For those who are fighting apathy and anger on the inside while fighting injustice and chaos from without. Not to mention lies on both sides. I have had the privilege of knowing more than my share, of leaning on them and holding them...and learning to see the world through their priceless eyes.

Eve is a woman cut out of the cardboard with the top layer still attached and twisting out and away from her in a swirl of petals. The petals make me think of my mom actually, in hindsight. She loves flowers and always says it is because Eve was made in the garden. The sunflower is special. Not only is it among my favorite flowers and one that has been a motif in my life for years now, but that particular one arrived to me over 600 miles in a package with cookies and other things from my sister. I love that she would do that and that she knows that it makes sense to me.

The flowers are also beauty--deep, real, and fleeting. And though a woman will outlive many flowers, are we much different? But more than that, is the idea represented in the question written along the side: Am I just another Eve? This is the question that I wrote on a sticky note and left on my bedroom wall until it became a painting.

I think it is an important question, obviously. But seriously, I know so many women wondering if there is a point to trying. Or if they are just another Eve preset for destruction. If she could not come through on one decision before corruption, why does anyone else hope to? There is so much shame and so much trying to be strong and taking on guilt that is not theirs to hold. Like we are trying to pay for a mistake that was never ours and we are taking responsibility because someone needs to and it is not out of our way. Not always, obviously, but often enough to be observed. Oh, there is so much more that could be said on that, but I will save it rather than risk beating a dead horse.

And so finally, the phrase that follows me and drags me back and down to wrestle with it again and again...and when it is not doing that, it quietly mocks me from its place on Eve in my room. We must love and lose or else lose more.

We have to keep on trying. We love unreasonable things. We love after being hurt and expect a different result. We get hurt. We do it again. We may learn and do it differently, but it never really loses the risk and danger that are inherent. We trust. We open ourselves up because it will be worth it when it is real and when it lasts. Because, when we shut ourselves away for the sake of safety or fear or strength, we lose our most valuable and beautiful component. We make ourselves hard and fortified and we lose access to our own hearts. We become a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy in regards to our fear that we will never escape Eve's mistake.

Hold on. Give me just one additional thought which I cannot take credit for:

To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.

C.S. Lewis

There. That's Eve. And yeah, this is not really only for women...there are a lot of thoughts here that are without borders and confines. Yet, it is my women who hang heavily on my heart when I think about this for any length of time, and that is my artist's privilege and responsibility at work. Thank you.