Chronicles of Change

All good things come to those who change. Once the decision has been made, there are several processes that need to happen. Visualization of the change is necessary, but so are the practical things that can bring it to fruition. One must research and study, and then prepare the necessary tools. It also takes courage and an iron will to leave behind habits of being that have not been working.

Then comes the slow and steady application of the visualizations, research and preparations. In other words, action.

These are the chronicles of my change:

Professionally, I have decided to remove myself emotionally from the many failures of the system in which I work. In letting go of the things that are not in my control, I am free to focus on the things that are. I am free to focus on the fun in my profession not the frustrations.

Personally, I have been speaking up to the people in my life who have thus far marginalized me. I don't keep silent out of politeness, anymore. I don't grumble to others about it. I just tell them what I find acceptable and what I don't. Bottom line. I don't want to spend any more time trying to keep people in my life who don't respect my time or my company. I have people who do; I'll focus on them.

Physically, I am in the process of changing my diet. I call it a process because there is a huge learning curve here. The first thing off the menu is gluten; and so many things contain gluten. Things that are prepared gluten-free are very expensive which means I need to make the foods I used to buy. Like bread or bread products. I need to change the way I prepare my meals. I have to be conscious of everything that's in every forkful of food I eat.

I am swimming in a huge kaleidoscope of changes. It can seem daunting; but I am excited. Yes, excited because the things that are not working are not worth keeping. It clears the way for things that do.

Drop It

Fresh starts aren't just about goals and resolutions. Fresh starts are also about a new way of looking at things, a new way of reacting.

When we clean and declutter, we make decisions about what is worth keeping and what needs to be thrown away. Sometimes, the things that we hold onto for dear life - habits, reactions, beliefs, mementos - are things that hold us back. Sometimes, we have to grit our teeth, take a deep breath, and toss, toss, toss.

See Genie Toss...

Tossing away past hurts and grudges. They serve no purpose, except keep me in a bitter soup.

Tossing away past judgements and preconceptions. Life has moved on. It's a different moment in time. I will look on the world like a new born.

Tossing away things that caused me pain. Holding onto them is holding on to pain.

Today, a stone-faced Vice Principal who will never look me in the eye when I talk to her, summarily vetoed the changes I made to my department timetables. Changes that she said I could make. Changes that would give more teachers courses they want to teach. Changes that would put fewer teachers in two departments. Changes that would allow teachers to teach in the same room instead of rushing from one end of the school to the other. Changes that took me hours and hours of discussions, consultations, and paperwork to make.

Why did she do this? Because she can.

Because she can.

I will not put myself in that position any longer. I care about my teachers, about my students, about my profession. I will not be a puppet on the string of incompetent, uncaring, vindictive, power-hungry individuals. Individuals who do not care about teachers, or students, or this profession.

I am dropping it. I put in a good fight. I made a difference. I made things better.

Of this I am proud.

It's as far as I can go in this environment. Now is the time to focus on things I can change. Now is the time to make a difference in smaller scales, in areas where I am allowed to affect change, and screw those "running" the school (to the ground).

Now is the time for me to focus on the things that bring Genie joy, not heartache, not disappointment, not frustration, not pain.

I feel lighter already. :)

List, Lust, Last

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This is another "mixed media" digital piece. I painted the background and the goddess. Then I went hunting for Egyptian brushes that are compatible with my PS dinosaur, but they were humongous so I had to do a lot of recrafting. I am beginning to miss Paint Shop Pro (Corel). It was so much more versatile. I can't for the life of me figure out how to make my own brushes on PS! Anyway, I added a collage piece (the necklace). Et voila! Egyptian goddess. You might notice I have been using blue and yellow combinations a lot lately. These make me happy. :)

Yesterday, I was reminded that, really, all you need to do is ask. As many of you know, we got bombarded by the white stuff, AGAIN. The person that was doing our snow had told us (my neighbor and I) that he no longer had the time to do it. I sat here, working from home all day, and wondered what the hell I was going to do. I decided I would worry about it later. Then, shortly after dinner, someone knocked on my door. Two boys with shovels! One of them a student at the school. You can imagine my glee! Ten bucks later, and the snow was cleared. Thank you Universe! :)

This morning I woke up with a new sense of purpose, a list of goals and a lust for life! Almost ready made, these plans, really, were simmering in the noggin for a while.

I have been pondering what I want to do to maximize my home space. I need to position the living arrangements in order for every room in my house (not that many) to be used to its best capacity. At minimum cost. So here is my home to-do list. I am recording it for myself mostly.

This requires minimum spending: new track lights, energy efficient front door, square table (thrift/garage sale) and folding doors/curtain (thanks Molly!) to separate the front porch from the room for warmth.

This is the first floor plan now:

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This is after:

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The back of the house where the bedroom is now, faces my garden. Wouldn't it be so much better to look out into the garden when I am working or creating than a street? It also faces west, which has the most light. Tada! My super duper economical way of maximizing my space.

Oh. And I am sorry to say, that as much as I adore Mac, I am going to have to go with PC laptop because I simply cannot afford the 500 buck difference.

Tomorrow I will tackle the basement plans! This is fun! Brings me back to the time I wanted to be an architect, interior decorator.

And last, but not least, I am also making plans for my Tarot deck and book, and how to pay off my line of credit. My goal is to retire at 50. Yes, you heard it first here. 50! :)

It Begins...

Yesterday, I think my head exploded.

I got into this state of creativity, and activity like no other! I played around in photoshop all day. Took a long walk to balance things out. Several ideas crystallized in my head and formed decisions. More on the decisions later. :) But first art...

I am exploring light and shade right now in photoshop and I made another graphic novel scene. For those of you who don't know what a graphic novel is, the best way I can describe it, is it's a comic book for adult audiences. It deals with more serious, darker issues. They use usually mostly black and white stylized art. Frank Miller is a great and prolific example of a graphic artist.

Here is my scene:

Subway Encounter

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It's full of mystery and intrigue, and little bit sexy too. My focus was light and shade. Light and shade. S0 I took out all the colors except her lips. It took me a long time to do this because drawing with a mouse is becoming increasingly challenging. I need to stop whining about it, and go buy myself a tablet already. I'm taking the day off Wednesday for my birthday, so that is what I will get myself. :)

The next piece sort of came out by itself. I started freehand drawing without really thinking about it. I was going to draw yet another scene from this graphic novel which seems to be developing on its own, frame by frame. (More things to ponder...)

Cityscape

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This is all new to me. What I like about this above piece is the free-flowing "nothink" (thank you Kim ) way I made it. I didn't attempt to be realistic in anyway, yet it captured the essence of this city. I am surprising myself! It's really exciting to create. From nothing, comes something. And there it is!

The Decision

I could not ignore the screaming, and from your lovely advice, I didn't. Besides, I couldn't if I tried.

So Ola! Moana is reborn... here! <-Please, click on the link and leave her some ♥ love!@ :) It's a blog-zine (has this be coined yet?) in its infant stages, but I am excited!

I have to say all this surge of creativity is in large part due to you!

Y0ur encouragement, your comments, your own amazing creativity in whatever form it takes, is fueling me. Leah's Creative Every Day, Jamies' Next Chapter series, your sublime art, writing, cooking, decorating, photography, collaging, pottery, videos, child rearing, crafting, jewelry designing, Mantra Mondays, Trash Tuesdays, Project 365, Celebrating the heArt loveliness is infectious and I love it!

THANK Y♥U! and Blessed be :)

Cynics and Scapes

I had a couple of "encounters" yesterday with people from the Tribe of Negative. They spewed their cynicism and criticism, trying to dominate a foothold into my consciousness. Guess what happened? They didn't succeed.

I can be a cynic. I have been accused by those who judge too quickly that I am. Sometimes truth can be seen as cynicism. Sometimes when I point out the disingenuous, I can be called a cynic. But I have not put someone down, and certainly not for the sake of making myself feel better.

I can be sarcastic. Hello? I'm a Capricorn. We have it patented. But, my sarcasm is more societal than personal. My sarcasm is my sharp wit, but it is not used to cut someone up into shreds (unless they ask for it). Not to make myself feel smarter than someone who is feeling low. I don't take someone's genuine intent and belittle it, publicly, for the sake of humour so my nasties can laugh. That's just playground bully tactics.

I often tell my students that there is an intrinsic difference between a critique and criticism. And that is in intent.

When one critiques, one takes an objective look at a product, and assesses it first for its successful aspects, and then makes suggestions for its aspects that fall short. Critiques are valuable both to the creator and to the person offering his/her opinion. It is not a personal attack.

Criticism is. People use criticism to find fault, to belittle, to tear apart someone's genuine effort. The critic pretends to be objective, but the criticism takes on an ugly face. It attacks the creator through his/her creation.

I know many will not agree with this differentiation, but it is key. There is value in pointing out where something can be bettered, where weaknesses can become strengths, and anyone who offers their work up for public consumption must be prepared for it.

The problem is, we now live in a society where tearing someone down has become this mob mentality of gleeful destruction. Look at any "entertainment news" show. Read some reviews. Go to some "spoof" blogs whose sole purpose is to make their cronies laugh at the expense of someone else's genuine attempts/endeavours.

Anyway. I had to get that out! Thank you for indulging me. :)

I am not going to go into further details, because these people do not need encouragement or acknowledgment. But I will thank them. Because they showed me their true colors, and they showed me who I do not want in my life. And that is wonderful! :)

So now. Art.

Treescape

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I have always been engrossed by trees. Metaphorically they offer their root system for grounding, their reaching up toward the sun for freedom, their many faces for emotions. Spiritually, they offer the solace of endurance, stability, nourishment, and safety. Trees can be majestic or frightening, depending on the setting, the circumstances, the scene. There are so many types of trees, each with his/her own personality. They bear fruit. They flower. They carry houses where laughter and secret societies bloom. They sway in the tropical breezes, or shiver in the frosty fog. Trees are tall and stately, or dwarfed and knotty. They have faces; they have life force; they have wisdom. Trees are just plain magical. So I painted trees. In PS for the first time. And guess who came to visit? Little red and a magpie! :) But I didn't stop there. :)

I have always been captivated by graphic novels, anime, and their artistic style. So I decided, I would experiment to see what I could do with it. Remember, I'm a total newbie. But here it is:

Toonscape

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I painted the girl and man trying to make it as stylized as my outdated PS and mouse will allow. (I simply must get a tablet!) I worked on the shading, and its a bit off kilter, but trust me when I say, hours of work on them and multiple layers to even approximate the effect I was going for.

Some of you might recognize this man. He has appeared in two of my Tarot cards, and is a face that recurs.

The backdrop is from a picture a friend sent me long ago of a neighbourhood in NYC. She didn't include the name of the place and I have long ago lost track of her (sad), so I cannot enlighten you. I manipulated the light and texture to make it more stylized to go with the effect I am trying to create. Et voila! Toonscape.

I am committed to trying as many new things and styles as possible in my creative ventures.

One thing I have been mulling over was to resurrect an online magazine (e-zine) I started a few years back with a partner who dropped out almost immediately because of personal issues. It was a tongue-in-cheek woman's magazine hosted by a character we created called "Moana". We called the magazine "Ola! Moana". My friend, Danette, drew most of the images that went with the various sections. It has been now prodding me daily and the idea is now screaming. "Make me into a new blog!"

Can I ignore screaming?

I don't even know where I have put all the material. Do I start from scratch? Can I keep up with this blog and all the wonderful bloggers, the two blog projects I am participating in, my art, my job and this?

I have a lot to think about, no?

What do you think? :)

May your days be merry, full of wonderful scapes and no nasties! :)

Blessed be :)

Dilemmas and Fruit

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I was feeling kinda fruity last night, after an eventful day at work. So I experimented some more with Photoshop. As I said yesterday, I wanted to combine my digital manipulation skills with painting using this program. So here is my first attempt. The background is peeled clementines in a watercolor effect. The girl, "Clementine", is a manipulated photo of one of her namesakes. I pushed and prodded and painted and highlighted and tweaked a clementine into a face. The hair is a manipulation of the leaves. I added some clementines for her headdress, then played around with light and colors. Le voila!

So, while you ponder Clementine, here is today's installment, of Genie's Dilemma. The three page directive went over quite well with the department. I have heard no grumblings; instead people seemed engrossed in it. I got all the exams revised according to specs. AH!

Of course, since things were going so smoothly, another lovely new challenge fell into my lap, well, actually, into my mailbox. The posting for my position (Curriculum Leader) and for the Assistant CL were placed in my box, as a subtle reminder that I need to reapply for this job if I want it for another year.

Do I want it for another year? Sheesh. Can't I have one day of peace? heh

Renata, who is the ACL right now was supposed to have the job for another year, and was surprised and delighted to find out that it was posted again. She doesn't want to reapply.

Do I? Of course, I have very little time to think about this...

Deep in thought, I made yet another fruity concoction with Photoshop (PS).

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I used my other favorite fruit, the pomegranate. It inspired a "Little Red Riding Hood" theme. I took a photo of a half pomegranate, and manipulated, painted, shaded, pushed and prodded it into her face. I duplicated the layer, and manipulated it to create her hood. The background image is a plate of pomegranates in watercolor brush, softened so as not to overpower the main figures. Then I painted a hand and a pomegranate that is being offered to her as "bait"? "reward"? Something?

I have a lot to think about today. I know I have achieved much, with Renata, in less than a year, and I can be proud of my accomplishments. There have been endless sources of frustrations, but these will exist whether I take this position for another year or not. The difference then will be, I will have no control over the situation, and it might easily revert to what it was before we put in all this work. IF I take the job, it will mean I might be working with someone who won't be as easy to work with as Renata. Maybe no one at all, since no one applied for the position I have right now in six rounds of postings last year. Did I mention our school does not have the best of reputations right now? Do you wonder why, reading my rants? :)

I will be still, and listen to what the Universe whispers to me.

As part of the process of becoming more authentically me, I am participating in another amazing blogging book club 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women hosted by the Incomparable and Highly Creative, and Resourceful, and Amazing Jamie!

I will be blogging about this daily, but I want to start by acknowledging my creative past.

I was always a creative kid. Doodling, fascinated with beads, filling notebooks with gibberish even before I understood human language. My father was an artist himself, an architect and a lover of all the arts. He made sure my life was steeped in the beauty of music, the lyricism of fine arts, the enchanting lines of architecture, the wonder of photography.

It was not until I entered the school system that I started to feel that being eroded day by day with constant criticism, constant comparison, constant rules.

• I wrote my first poem at age 8 about a butterfly. My teacher laughed at it.
• I was in a choir in elementary school. Our teacher would walk around to listen to us, and she told me to lip sync because I was throwing the others off.
• In my grade 8 art class, my watercolor of a woman was scoffed at by the teacher saying it looked more like a bull frog!
• I took piano lessons for 8 years (a lot of 8's) and when I joined the conservatory, my piano teacher screwed up his face like he swallowed a whole grove of lemons, and said "You have a lovely musicality (enter lemon face) but your technique is appalling."

Did that stop me? In some ways, yes (I gave up the piano and was afraid to sing). In some ways, no (I kept writing and painting).

I hated school until I went to university. There I found praise, encouragement, and respect for my creations and my ideas. I found professors who were not only creative themselves but who inspired creativity in us through their assignments.

What has it taught me? To be a better teacher. To encourage my students' creativity, to give them choices, to honor their interpretations and respect their visions. Because no matter what, no one has the right to shut someone else down because they see the world, and paint it, in a different light.

That is what I have learned.

I hope your days are bright, your decisions easy and your creativity fruitful! :)

Blessed be :)