14 March 2017
“One person saying Yes Yes and another person saying No No, that’s tension.”-Betsy Cox
Make a list of all the things you’d like to say No to, then make a list of everything you’d like to say Yes to. Make art inspired from these lists.
13 March 2017
I unfriended someone this morning on social media, a woman who leads with her “I’m a Christian” banner, but who daily and consistently posts things that are disparaging to others, about people and groups of people with whom I know personally she has little actual experience. She’s older, and has limited life experience, so I had alternately either ignored her ignorance or had tried, gently, to share my own experiences with the people she judged. Her fear, it seems, runs too deep. But this morning, as she posted multiple things mocking and denigrating millennials, I was just done.
Am I judging her? Maybe. I’ll think on that. Pray on it too. But for now, her persistent fear and judgment of people about whom she is ignorant are not something I want in my life every day.
Make art about judging, about judging through ignorance, or–be brave!–educate yourself on someone you have previously judged.
11 March 2017
Spent the day lost in a book.
Make art about being lost in a good way.
12 March 2017
Dreamt a future conversation with my grandson, where we talked about what it meant to create home wherever you are, that our true home is what we carry inside us, from our experiences, from the ancestors. He nodded solemnly, as if he already knew this.
Make art about where home is, or how we create home.
10 March 2017
Make art about messages from the other side.
8 March 2017
Make art about collective power.
9 March 2017
Make art about the violence of poverty.
7 March 2017
Make about what you’re hiding, about what they’re hiding.
6 March 2017
Make art about the Other, about Otherness, about being the Other, about fearing the Other, about discovering the Other.
4 March 2017
In many cultures, the teaching of heritage and cultural practices is carried out by members of the extended family, grandparents, aunts, and uncles. In certain cultures, this relationship and teaching is formally recognized, and in cultures with matrilineal descent is referred to as the avunculate, sometimes called avunculism or avuncularism, a social institution where a special relationship exists between an uncle and his sisters’ children. Several Native American tribes practice a form of this, where the uncle is responsible for teaching the children social values and proper behavior while inheritance and ancestry is reckoned through the mother’s family alone. Modern day influences have somewhat but not completely erased this tradition.
Thinking on this especially today, as I watch my sons interact with their sister’s baby son, my GrandPerson Max <3. Thinking on it too, as it’s the weekend of my lovely daughter’s birthday, and my own brother, Bill, now gone on to the next life, was present and there for her literally from the moment she first drew breath. He remained a constant source of Love and education for all of my kids until he left us. My daughter Lia couldn’t say ‘Uncle Bill’ when she was small; it came out ‘Opie Gill.’ So now her brothers are not just ‘Uncles’ to her son, but ‘Opies.” Important job they have ❤ And I have no doubt they’ll honor it well.
Make art about extended family, about aunts, or uncles, about those elders from whom we learn our culture.
5 March 2017
Spent the day with my sons, two wise and funny young men. The two things that impress me about both of them are: 1) their shared sense of honor, and 2) their shared insatiable curiosity. They are both always–always–learning something new, or seeking to learn something new, or thinking about how they can learn something new.
Make art about learning, about loving to learn, about the magic and mystery of curiosity.
3 March 2017
“The moment a child is born, the mother is also born.”-Osho
Thirty years ago today, the first of the three greatest miracles of my life occurred: I met my daughter Lia. Now she’s a mama herself ❤ The miracle of Endless Love ❤
Make art about daughters, or about being born.
So in the last few months, I’ve experienced a broken pipe, a broken arm, and broken car.
Make art about fixing what’s broken.
Mary Carroll-Hackett: Poetry and Prose 
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