My Father’s Daughter

I realized I’ve been neglectful of my blog lately. As I was trying to figure out what to post, I also realize that I have been very busy artistically lately. So many things to tell you about, but they’ll each have to wait their turn.

I have a design wall in my studio. I seldom use it for designing. It is more the place I place orphaned projects while I wait for inspiration to complete them. Most of the time I ignore them as they stare at me. Sometimes I look at the wall and rearrange the pieces and then walk away, venturing to other projects that seem more urgent or exciting.

I am trying to motivate myself to create. I know I have the time, but I get stuck in a warp of a non-productive stuppor because I have too many things that could use my attention. I can’t decide which to tackle, so instead I don’t work on any of them. It is like a heavy blanket over my head restricting me from movement. My brain says move, but my body says “u-uh, no way.”

So, I’ve realized this about myself and I’m taking action to do something when the Lilliputians hold me down. I’m encouraging myself to create.

Today in my quandry to move forward, I spied a piece on the design wall that I started almost 4 years ago. It was a Reader’s Challenge for Quilting Arts Magazine. They wanted you to take a photograph and create the piece in fabric.

As I said, I started this almost 4 years ago. It was at a time I was in a heavy personal turmoil. Everything around me was shaking apart. My entire life was in an upheaval. I decided to work the challenge just to stay mentally pre-occupied. I chose a photograph that my father took. I inhertited many of his artistic photos when he died, and I found this one interesting. Just an old brick wall crumbling with red poppies in a field.  I liked where I was going with the piece but I let it sit all these years. Mocking me on my design wall. So close to being finished, yet needing 4 years of mocking to get me to complete it.

This morning on my walk with the dogs, I stopped and chatted with a friend. She playfully laughed at me for being such an eclectic personality. I have a tremendously diverse field of interests and people see that in me. I’m restless and want to learn and do. I call it having many lives or personalities. I refer to my life as “when I was the biologist…” or “when I was the web designer…” or…

What struck me in her laughter, was the realization that my dad, too, was like me. “When he was the Navy seaman…,” “When he was the fireman…,” When he was the artist…” or …you get the picture. He was a lot of different people too.

When I explained this to my friend, she said, “You are your father’s daughter.” I cannot agree more. That incomplete piece that mocked me all these years on my design wall, had to be completed today. It proves that his evolution into being an artist, is deeply within me. I have taken what he has started and melted it into my own. Yes, I am my father’s daughter.