Friday, September 9, 2011

Fall is near...

The air I fantastize about breathing while breathing Phoenix air.

The weather forecast keeps taunting me with potential thunderstorms and temperatures under 100 degrees.  I try to reflect on the summer and I barely remember it happening… just a blur of frustration at living in this wretched dirty sweaty ugly city and hiding in the house with my delicious husband, wonderful dogs and blessed air conditioning watching all 6 seasons of Lost.  I wish there were more seasons. 
I did successfully revel in the reaching of my next intention, which is obtaining my teaching certification in fine arts.  I cannot explain the joy and relief I now feel having reached this transformative decision.  In going through this process, each student must take and pass the state’s proficiency assessment regarding the specific subject matter they want to teach, mine being fine arts.  So I print out the practice test and study guide… and failed hardcore.  Being that I’ve always just created, and never trained, I have never been formally educated in the relevant details of art history, theory, critiquing, etc.  The few questions I did know were regarding materials, process, relationship, etc.  So realizing how much I don’t actually know about these topics made me nervous initially.  Not too long ago, I would have been convinced I need to just get another degree and put off the test until afterwards.  But after a nice yoga session, I decided to find my nearest library and go get what I needed to learn the material.  I mean I could be a professional student at this point, so why the hell not?  Hooray for public libraries by the way, please support your local collection of knowledge!  So here I sit (taking a break to spew this blog) cramming my face off for this test.  I have until November 19th, so I think I’ll be ok… but I also realized that I’ve never really cared about a test as much as I do this one.  My undergrad and graduate degrees didn’t involve much formal testing, and I never had to take the SATs, ACTs, GREs, etc. , so its not like I had an opportunity to care, but I’m really excited about this.  This is knowledge that I’ve always wanted, but never had time to really get while I was learning all the other madness.  I’m actually savoring every word of it, not skimming, and actively working to retain it.  Not that I didn’t care about everything else I’ve studied… its just that this is the stuff that so much of my soul is made of… creation, depiction, visual communication, beauty… it just makes my heart sigh with relief.
It is not the case that I didn’t try to go to art school several times before I landed where I did academically, it just never worked out for me financially to go, and after 4 attempts going awry in one way or another, I decided that maybe I just wasn’t meant to go to art school.  But I can still sit here in this moment and feel like I actually was meant to go to art school, or maybe I’m still meant to do so in the future.  I don’t regret my academic choices by any means, I highly value my experiences, knowledge and relationships that came as a result of the entire process.  And it isn’t the most practical idea anymore, having already gone through graduate school and holding the loans to show for it.  I’ve considered the doctorate in arts education, but I’m not really interested in doing that level of research at this point.  Maybe I will be later, but not now.  Who knows.  I know I want to do an artist’s residency at some point, preferably in the European countryside for at least 2 months.  But right now, this teaching certification has fallen into place beautifully and easily and my brain is bursting with curriculum ideas.  I think this may be a critical milestone in satiating my constant desire to figure out exactly what I’m supposed to be ‘doing with my life’…but most importantly my feeling that there is a hole in my heart that can only be filled with art.  Hey that rhymed! Awesome.  
Cheers,
Emily

Thursday, September 1, 2011

Illegal Wood and Tarantula Stabbings

I really need to discipline myself to write these things when it is fresh in my chaotic and forgetful mind.  Anyway, this hellish summer of intolerable heat and filth was nicely broken up by a weekend of camping up north near Flagstaff.  I'm slowly learning that the term 'camping' in places aside from Montana and the very tops of mountains means "pay a fee to pitch your tent 10 feet from this other person right off this lovely blacktop that we laid through what used to be a beautiful forest.  But don't worry we left as many trees as we could without losing profitable space so we could take pictures of them for marketing purposes."  I'm slowly accepting that this is what camping will be like when I am not back home.  Its ok.  As long as the air is clean and I am surrounded by greenery and trees, then I am happy.  It was pouring rain as we arrived at our site, and there were only two other people camped in the area.  The rain was welcomed, as was the privacy.  We set up our sweet nylon abode and kitchen area, complete with a tarp foyer.  The dogs were pissed that we were making them hang out in the rain, but once they realized that there was cool dirt to lay in, joy ensued. 
Its rad, we know.
After we crawled in our delicious tent, Barnum and Bailey's 3-Ring Circus rolled in and we woke up to tents, pop-up campers, BMWs and various other things that don't really do well in the forest surrounding us on all sides.  Bye bye privacy... but what to expect in an urban campground?  :) 
Interesting points of the weekend included...
Seeing one of these trying to crawl into our tent: Don't worry we stabbed it repeatedly with a large stick while squealing.
No joke.
Camp host dude rolling up on his golf cart after we returned from fishing to tell us that the size of our wood was illegal.  I could make several jokes here, but his ridiculousness took care of itself.  "I just saved you two from a $5,000 fine and the Forest Service taking you STRAIGHT to jail!  I told you to read the sign on the bulletin board!"  (He never said any such thing about a bulletin board.)  When I went to look at it, there was a handwritten note thumbtacked to it saying that wood had to be under 24" in length and 5" in diameter.  In other words, you had to buy his wood for $15 a bundle rather than bringing/chopping your own.  Sorry buddy, we're not yuppies, nor are we stupid. 

The dude in the BMW came and asked us to borrow a lighter, way past dark, because he was trying to start a fire with his car lighter.  We also had to tell him how to start the fire. And he was scared of our dogs.
See how scary...

The nearest lake to our campground on the map was Mormon Lake, so we went looking for it.  Turns out it was a very large field, with a lovely little seasonal village on the edge.  Apparently the lake dried up.  Luckily there were other lakes in the area and we were able to give the doggies their first 'swimming' experience.  Oh the hilarity. I wish my camera was waterproof.

This weekend away in happier climate and environment was very much needed, as I was ready to punch Phoenix repeatedly in the face.  I still could, but I feel much more detached from it now and am doing my very best to not let it affect me.  Nothing earthly lasts forever, the weather will become more tolerable, and at some point we will move somewhere that is actually enjoyable to look at and breathe in again.

Next endeavor? Getting my teaching certification, with a specialization in Fine Arts. Eff. Yes.