Takin' me back....

   I remember when I was a little kid, I craved excitement. I loved the carnival, the circus and pin-the -tail-on-the-donkey....I loved chaotic environments because that's where I felt most at home, when things were still and quiet at home I was always waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the drama to begin. I never wanted to make the drama begin myself,  I didn't really know how ...... and my older brother and sister and mom and dad were all so much better at it then I could ever be. But there was always some drama playing out between my parents and siblings, I survived by learning how to be entertaining or invisible.

   So when I first came to NYC I loved the pace and the constant surprises, I learned how to recognize the different sounds of the uptown and downtown trains at my subway station and I rushed and ran when I heard my train coming. Now, when I hear that sound I tell myself it's not an emergency. As I'm preparing for the final exit from my art studio of 8 years, the place where I make my artwork, not the apartment where I live. I spent a couple of weeks waking up in the middle of the night with an overwhelming sense of dread......."I'm not prepared",  "It's too much work" "I won't be able to find an affordable studio" , "I can't aford a mover"........thoughts like this overwhelmed me, but I addressed the move one step at a time, I'm halfway done and Ive learned so much in this process....mostly that I don't have to be in a hyper-excited state of emergency to get it done. It's just part of the job, a regular part of an artist's life. Other people have gotten through it and I will too.

   It took a long while to learn this, to not catastrophize every major event in my life and even though I knew I shouldnt, I couldnt get out of that trap....it was like an addiction.