Making new memories while reflecting on old

For this month, I worked in Heather Rodocker's sketchbook. Her theme is "Childhood Memories". I love seeing the sketches before mine and how our lives can be so similar, even in our differences. 

It was challenging to settle on one. Should it be a happy, a sad, a weird memory? Which one is actually important to me enough to draw? For some reason, I keep coming back to the memory of playing Monopoly with my sister. The whole range of human emotion played out: joy, frustration, trust, taste of victory and defeat. Epic battles that would last days during the summer. The next summer, she moved to another state. 

I started with the Monopoly board and didn't know what to do next. My sister and I were skyping when she suggested changing the street names to places near the house. I looked up the address on google. How was it that my whole world existed within a few block radius of each other? What a different life my son is having!

Then, thinking of that house, our neighbors, and the massive fig tree in the backyard, I knew what to draw. My sister and I would push each other to go higher and higher, we were in charge of picking figs for my mom's jam. How normal a life we had.

I drew the house with marker, then finger-pained with acrylic paint. I figured finger-painting was the best way i could connect to the theme of "childhood memories" . 

Many years later, my sister moved back into that house with her own family. When i visit, board games are still time well spent with loved ones. 

One Day at a time (Louise E. Donaghey's Book)

The theme one day at a time was something that I was not so sure on how to approach. I wanted to have some timeline to be incorporated within the design and implement the printmaking examples I was using for the new course i was teaching. So I thought to add a tattoo of a personal timeline onto the self-portrait. I hope that I continue to exist beyond the 2034 date near my jugular vein, or perhaps it is an expiration date (Louise, check in with me on Wednesday, June 2034).. Stay tuned-

Erin's wisdom

Erin's sketchbook introduction resonated with me. She writes about "enjoying the process of creation, layering words + image, found + repurposed items" and that she "feel[s] nourished every time I make something adds joy to the word." Oh, to always give myself that permission to nourish self, and oh to be confident in the value of joyful contributions that appear to have no monetary or productivity rooted value.

I tried to heed her words and just play--and to play based on inspiration from the world around me. A friend in India sent a block print card (upper left), and from there I doodled my version of the web of flowers. Into AI it went, and the flowers were recolored over and over again. Those hours could have been spent in many more significant ways, but I don't think my heart would be quite as happy.