ArtistMoms! Waxing Philosophic

Waxing philosophic

Flying Solo

January 26, 2004

I am now a single mother, officially. After 12 years of marriage, my husband and I decided to stop hurting each other, to stop sacrificing our lives to the idea of matrimony. Visible relief can be evidenced on both sides. Pain bubbles up occasionally. This marriage was going to be forever. We were going to grow old together and recall affectionately the bad times and the good times. Toward the end, there were mostly bad times. The pain of separation feels dull and manageable though, compared to the pain of seeing no way out of the tangle we'd created around ourselves and each other.

The boys react differently. My two-year-old loves to see Daddy, but forgets about him in the course of his daily activities. The six-year-old sees things with a more troubled mind. He misses Dad, and wonders why we all can't live together still. Dad has an X-box and they bond through the pixelated melee. I prod, suggesting surely there are other reasons he wants to see his father. He thinks and, eyes cast down, softly answers, yes. Ironically, I can see a connection between them that is much stronger now, in separation, than I ever saw while we lived under the same roof. I hope his father cultivates a similar connection with the younger child. It doesn't come naturally to him, and just as I had to learn about budgeting and taxes, he is learning what it means to be a father.

I've painted more in the past several months than ever before. The ideas, as always, flow freely, but now there is time to execute them, energy to stay with them, uncorrupted joy and unveiled pain to infuse into them. The worst critic has largely been silenced. Would that it were so simple at every stage of life.

Thoughts of how my children will reflect on their childhood occupy much of my mental wandering. Will they appreciate that their mother chose to live a conscious life? Will they glean strength from the example I've set for them? Or will they resent my selfish decision to be alone, to paint, to pursue my individual dreams. Will they grow fond of their newly untrod-upon mother, or would they have preferred the quiet, stewing one. I should think the former will serve them well. Regardless, I can't go back into that tiny shell. It simply isn't big enough for me now.

I have a new motto - live consciously. Very simple, but in my case, profound and just freshly discovered. Decisions and attitudes I looked upon as conscious turned out to be mired in expectation, fear, tradition, habit, passive aggression. I invite you all to look at your lives. Look at the things you aren't comfortable looking at. When you have an idea, do you head for the fridge instead of the studio? Do you watch tv every night and complain that you don't have time to create? Are you blaming someone else for your flagging motivation? Is there an idea brewing in your head that feels too big or too scary to come out? Think about birthing your baby. Who'd have thought the contents of that huge tummy could come out and leave you relatively intact - happier even? Anais Nin wrote: And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

For all my evangelism, I still am not immune to doubt, fear, insecurity, fatigue, just plain grouchiness, usually all on a daily basis. The difference is that I look at these things as they are and move through them, instead of blaming and moping and grinding to a halt, unable to process them consciously. I own them now. Mine is the only signature, and it will do nicely, thank you. It would be simple to blame my husband for all the years of my disquietude, but that would grant him far more power than he deserves. Instead, I see this change as one of a series of awakenings - with luck, awakenings that will continue throughout my life.

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