Self-expression/Trash/or Art?

As someone who has mostly worked with less than conventional materials, I am always interested in conversations about what art is, or isn't.  This article in the Los Angeles Times engaged me, and many others, in that conversation again.  Reading their comment section, I see that some went from 0 to explosion in short order.

It used to make me angry (and defensive) when someone would suggest that what I do with gourds was not "art" (with that tinge of disparagement in the voice...or, was my sensitivity barometer too finely calibrated?)  There are certain undeniable rights to aging (or is it maturing?), and one of them is the throwing off of the yoke of caring what other people say.  It really is something to be treasured (and envied if you're not there yet).  Obviously, whomever is negating the art of fine craft is seriously limited in imagination.

But, oooops! Am I now one of that limited audience?  I actually have seen some visually beautiful and exquisitely executed graffiti, so I would have to say, no, I don't think I am dismissive of graffiti or outsider work.  And, I don't have problems with calling much of it "art".

 So, what are the distinctions between what is art and what isn't?  Good art and bad? Commercial and "real?"  Trendy and lasting?  For people with a language as massive, fluid, creative and alive as English is, we are sorely lacking in either actual words or use of words for "art."  (Admittedly we also seem to fall short of words for "love" and "snow" (not so short for "rain.")  I also mourn the lack of imagination when it comes to expletives.  (Skip the remainder of this paragraph if the 4-letter word offends you.)   How seriously can one be taken if the only response to "That's not art! That's crap" is the ubiquitous (and therefore relatively meaningless) "Fuck you!" (unless it is amended, as does my friend, Bob, with "...and the horse you rode in on."  After all, if that doesn't make you smile, you may need a day off.)

But, back to distinctions.  Personally, I distinguish between "decorative art" and "serious art", which now, upon reflection, seems pretty lame.  Does that mean that Diego Rivera's monumental mural work, which certainly "decorates" the National Palace in Mexico City is not "serious?"  It doesn't get too much more "serious" than holding a brush in one hand and a pistol in the other to guard your work against right-wing students as Rivera did with Creation done at the National Preparatory School, also in Mexico City.  So much for that distinction.

What about distinguishing between work that is traditional, executed with great skill, and work that is innovative, experimental, untrained?  That lets out Dubuffet, the father of outsider art and may allow in the many who are painting the same aesthetic over and over without expansion of their own sensitivities.

In regards to Chaka, many comments referenced his hoody connections to crime, the criminal aspects of painting on private property.  What does any of that have to do with art?  How does what the work is done on matter?  Does the Chaka work, hung in a gallery, mean more or less to the viewer than Chaka painted on the gritty walls of LA?  (I'd say that hung on gritty walls, it may have more relevance, since graffiti implies a certain revolution and willful act of protest which would certainly be lacking, made impotent, in a gallery setting.  Perhaps that is what is achieved, after all, by hanging Chaka in a fine LA gallery, 700 people in attendance, drinking wine, waiting to be photographed with this outsider who, in other scenarios, might be far more intimidating than they would like.  Is this our way of putting his guts in a box?  Or is this his triumph, knowing he's not really anything remarkable in the vast, untapped world of grafitti artists, as he mugs for the camera?  Or is Chaka a true self-expressionist?  He paints his name repetitively.  Listen to me!  I am here!  I count!  And does this make him an artist?

What about work that stimulates thought and conversation as its main end?  I think of a recent incident in my own town when a local artist hung a pair of men's underwear in his shop window.  Someone was offended and the controversy was ignited.  The underwear was unembellished in any way, but because the local artist is, in himself, controversial, the underwear became the fuse.  In the end, there were weeks of interesting conversations about what was art and why is art.  Seems that hanging underwear on a gallery wall is not the same as hanging underwear on a clothesline.  In the same way, Chaka writing his name over and over on a gritty LA wall, dodging cops and security guards, hanging by a rope from an overpass, risking jail and fines, is not the same as Chaka painting his name onto some surface that can be hung in a gallery.  The intent makes all the difference.

Or maybe not.  I have seen much work with good intent and disastrous results, either because of unclear intention, complete failure in execution, or both.  The road to mediocre artwork is often paved with good intentions.

Distinctions seem self-limiting. Exclusions the same.  Inclusions become a dilution of meaning.

It would seem, then, that we are in dire need of an expanded vocabulary.  This is a dictionary definition of art that I came across - "Human effort to imitate, supplement, alter, or counteract the work of nature. "


I am imagining myself at a holiday party.  An attractive couple joins me at the table.  Mr. Attractive turns to me and asks, "And what do you do?"  I spread my napkin in my lap, take a sip of water, and reply, "I make a very human effort to imitate, supplement, alter and sometimes counteract the works of nature that surround me."  He smiles, pats his wife's hand, and they turn to an imagined question from their other side.  Too broad, I decide.


There are many phrases for the styles of art: fine art, graphic art, impressionist art, expressionist art, modern art, classical art, outsider art, folk art, and dozens of others.  If we spent money on art history education in our public schools, this all would be so much easier.  I am flummoxed.  (Now isn't that a great word for confused, puzzled, baffled, bewildered, mystified, nonplussed, stumped, stymied?)  Why do we use only "art" for all the results of making a "human effort to imitate, supplement, alter, or counteract the work of nature?"


I just don't have the answer, so now I am going to return to carving, sanding, sculpting, painting, and grinding an interpretation of my inner thoughts about expressing the impermanence and significance of both my personal and female human relationship to the ethereal and spiritual qualities of an experience with a wall of succulents in my neighbor's garden.

From Start to Finish

Several weeks ago I posted an "in progress" group of pictures on my FB page.  I did finish the piece and here is the chronicle of the project - from start to finish.  It's a long process, doing a sculpted gourd using the natural direction of what nature gives me.  There isn't much sense in making drawings on paper because your plans will invariably go awry and your paper drawings will have been wasted.  I believe one has to "see" what the gourd wants to be, then help it become.

This tall snake gourd bent fairly gracefully in one direction,with a nice gentle swelling at the bottom.  The iris hiding there needed to be set free to blow in the garden breezes, leaves wanted to arch and droop as landing places for dragonflies and butterflies.  

After drawing the images onto the gourd and burning the line work in, the engineering begins - after all, when you cut a leaf or bloom from the center of the gourd, what will hold the remaining top to the bottom?  Leaves and stems must be rebuilt behind the flower which wants to lean outward.  After soaking the "free" parts of the design (blooms and leaves), the gourd walls are soaked in warm water and gradually bent, holding their positions with strings tied to weights or to the table, till the piece is completely dry.  If the parts are very narrow or the stem is all that holds the large bloom, support must be built onto the backside of the gourd wall.  But, careful, don't build so much support in that you can't reach the inside of the design where a butterfly might be resting.  The contraption in the pictures holds the gourd for me in any one of many positions.  I used to have to do the holding in my lap - very precarious!  All of the cut edges and the sculpture material added to make the design more 3-dimensional must be sanded, hence the mask.  The sander is loud - headphones help.  Sander makes talc-fine dust - so I hold the vacuum in my left hand while sanding with my right.  It's definitely a balancing act!

The painting is done in stages - basic colors applied in the beginning so that I don't mistake positive image for negative space.  Lots of layers of transparent acrylics build the nuanced color in each leaf and bloom.  Often something may start out life as magenta and end up as yellow!

Here are several views of the finished piece.  I miss gardening, but I love making one that lasts forever!  I'll be bringing this one to the Celebration of Fine Art, Scottsdale, opening Jan. 15.  Hope you'll get to see it!

The Pace of Mindfulness

I have lately become a fan of Daisy Hickman's blog, Sunny Room Studio.  Today she was reflecting on writing by Buddhist teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh who wrote,
     "Our habit energy is what causes us to repeat the same behavior thousands of times... The practice of mindfulness helps us to recognize that habitual energy.  Every time we can recognize the habit energy in us, we are able to stop and to enjoy the present moment.  The energy of mindfulness is the best energy to help us embrace our habit energy and transform it. The energy of mindfulness is the full awareness of the present moment...The energy of mindfulness carries within itself the energy of concentration.  When you are mindful of something, whether that something is a flower, a friend, a cup of tea, you become concentrated on the object of your mindfulness.  The more you are mindful, the more concentrated you become.  The energy of concentration is born from the energy of mindfulness.  And if you are concentrated enough, the energy of concentration contains the energy of insight.  Mindfulness, concentration, and insight are the energies that make up the Buddha."


Ms Hickman went on to say,  "A superficial life is much like an “unexamined life,” a sequence of events without meaning or purpose. Or understanding."


My studio is very sunny and quiet today, Sunday.  There is no music, or sound other than an occasional bird or muffled road noise from a passing car.  I am at work on an intricate gourd and, at the moment, the sculpture medium needs some drying time.  For a while I can drift in the topic of mindfulness.  


There is something acutely near my mind that I cannot quite grasp.  This sensation surfaces frequently when I am in the midst of my work.  The creative process is one of great concentration, or mindfulness, when one is fully engaged.  Some would call it focus.  Others might define it  in more religious terms as in God speaking to me.  I am neither a very scientific, nor a very religious person, so those analogies don't quite work for me.  Nor am I of a meditative nature.  My mind is not easy to quiet.  One of the most difficult things about being an artist is turning the generative mind off - sleep eludes me, and when it does come, it often arrives with much dream activity, sometimes solving problems, often giving the gift of wholly finished works which I must try to capture in my conscious mind in the instant of waking, lest they slip away.  But, I do like to ponder.  


Buddhist thought is often expressed in simplistic terms and becomes trivialized as greeting card adages.  An example of this was in vogue several years ago when everyone was spouting "you create your own reality," and much sadness transpired as folks with major illnesses came to believe that somehow they had created their illnesses, and parents dealing with the death of a child were shamed into believeing they were to blame for their tragic circumstances.  Too simplistic.  Not incorrect, perhaps, in certain deeper implications, but far too simple to be left unexamined.  Life is not a greeting card.  Why are we always looking for the simple, the easy, the quick in everything that we do?  

Ms. Hickman went on to say,  "A superficial life is much like an “unexamined life,” a sequence of events without meaning or purpose. Or understanding."  I agree with this, knowing that I have many superficial moments - after all, how deep is the moment I spend plucking my eyebrows or making certain my dishes don't have water stains on them?  We could talk about levels of superficiality here, but let's not.  Pick up People magazine for that.  But I do think that some pondering on the Buddhist Mindfulness-Concentration-Insight path is worth some time.

  

The link that Mr. Hanh makes is mightily important, because it points to growth, and by extension, change.  Ms. Hickman's "sequence of events" may coincide with a certain level of mindfulness (think focusing, visualizing that new car, winning lottery ticket, check-in-the-mail from nowhere).  But is there meaning or purpose beyond the simplistic car, ticket, check?  Does the mindfulness of the self (or self-desired object) lead to Mr. Hanh's "concentration?"  He says, "The more you are mindful, the more concentrated you become.  The energy of concentration is born from the energy of mindfulness."  So, when we are disappointed that the car doesn't materialize, do we recognize that we have not fully enrolled ourselves in the mindfulness of the car, to the point of concentration?  Probably not.  We, most likely, are like a child who wants what he wants now, until he wants something else in the very next moment.  Which leads to the question of what happens in the state of "mindfulness?"  Turns out that perhaps mindfulness is not so easy after all, nor simple.  I'm pretty certain that anyone reading this who has been practicing mindfulness for very long, is having difficulty staying in the moment, without clicking to another blog.  Yes, I say yes, not so easy.  Not simple.  How many things snag your consciousness when you are focusing on mindfulness of breathing? Please!  I know I've already copped to not meditating.  So what is there for us less disciplined folk, we who feel our stomach rumble in the middle of the out breath, who have to scratch the itch impeding our in breath, whose every aching joint and muscle scream for our attention while we sit cramped in the impossible lotus? 

There is this: slowing down.  That's all.  Just slowing down.  Try this: get three clocks- one with no second hand, one with a second hand, and one digital (stop watch) counting one-hundredths of a second.  Sit down with them, one at a time, and be mindful, or concentrate on one specific thing for two minutes.  Be mindful of how well you can do this in each given time sequence.  This is not rocket science, because, as I mentioned, I am not of a scientific bent.  It is, however, pretty obvious.  Given the slower pace of the clock with no second hand, your mind quiets itself, able to readjust it's thought even if it wanders.  It wanders, if you will, at a slower pace.  I think that perhaps what Mr. Hanh is telling us is to slow down.  Being in the moment is not equivalent to jumping into the moment.  It is slowing down your eternal forward motion enough so that the moment, the elusive moment, can envelope you.  The moment isn't stationary.  It isn't a stop in time.  The moment is moving forward also.  But, if one is able to slow down, become enveloped in the moment, that act will take you to a different place than you would otherwise have arrived at.  And that is the insight.  That by slowing down, we can change what we are consciously aware of; we can alter our moment, and in that altered moment, or altered consciousness, something may open for us.  An insight. An understanding.

"A superficial life is much like an “unexamined life,” a sequence of events without meaning or purpose. Or understanding."  A superficial life, then, is a life in which we, without consciousness, allow ourselves to be propelled by the ever increasing speed of the Universe, without pausing to experience our own being.  

THERE IS NO MOVEMENT WITHOUT RHYTHM

Thanks, Richard, for posting this on FB - makes for much thought in this time of electronic everything - ppl missing out on the joy of their own rhythms and the making of them through the satisfaction of work and play. I am always so grateful that I've been able to walk the path of the artist, creating with my imagination, and manifesting through problem solving thought, then experiencing the excitement and love of making it all physical with my own hands. Watching this video is watching every piece of medical advice charged high fees for in the "civilized" world, come to pass in the day-to-day existence of people living their lives with simplicity, exercise, joy, in community, with commitment. In some ways, the old ways will always work better - not in all ways, but in many. It seems to me, that the balance is what we have failed to develop. Let's make some music today without plugging anything in. Let's gather in the kitchen to create a feast with only our laughter and stories. Let's rest in the evening, happy in the day we shared.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVPLIuBy9CY

A Small Vacation

Replenishing oneself, when what you do for a living is make art, market art, sell art, ship art, move art, is something which must usually be accomplished in a short period of time - substantially less time than the two or three week vacation from a straight job.  Last weekend we combined a bit of art biz with a bit of stress relief by meandering around rural southern VA and northern NC, followed by a "side" trip to St. Augustine, FL.  Riding through a sea of cotton playing against the firery reds of autumn forests in NC where we had no bars (those would be cell phone bars) to distract us, was taking a deep breath of sweet relaxation.

We delivered some paintings to Hilton Head - extensions of the season into the home - 

followed by a walk in the woods near Blufton, GA.....

 

and on to visit my brother who was on a hunt for great cigars (ugh!) in St. Augustine - and we found them - hand made by the family, using tools of the trade that looked like they should be in a great antique display somewhere.  Just a moment in the day, but one in which I learned something I knew nothing about!

   

And then, back to Salisbury, to work in the studio - Piedmont Craftsmen is coming up soon!  And Celebration of Fine Art, Scottsdale, is already gearing up for their 2011 show - gotta be ready!

            

                  

                                                                                 

Finding Meaning in Texture, Giving Texture to Meaning

This painting is one part of a group installed as a large horizontal installation (though spaced individually about 6" between each).  Because I paint from texture and color, I depend on those elements to give me the information I need to develop meaning, or theme.  Some would say image, but since my work leans to impressionism or expressionism, I discourage the sense of finality that "image" conjures for me.  "Image" comes from the click of the digital camera, the slick magazine page torn out at the dentist's office, the picture our minds make because that is our ocular-cerebral function.  I have never spoken with anyone blind from birth, but I would like to know how they describe what they "see", or "imagine" when presented with a physical object.  That may be where "image"(likeness) reverts to its origin "imagine"(to picture to one's self) and retains a floating, ephemeral quality, not needing to be crystallized (unless of course the object presented to a blind person is something like a knife which would need to retain some mental impression of possible danger). If, in fact, this is the way in which blind people see, I can "imagine" an exciting working relationship between sighted artists and blind wordsmiths co-creating visions tossed back and forth like weightless dandelion heads till, scattered, they grow into a new kind of experimental verbal/ocular garden.  For me, then, to stay in the realm of "imagine", I need to push "image" aside and find the birth of idea, theme or meaning, another way.  Another way, and by no means the only way, is via texture and/or color.

Recently I signed on for an Essay class taught by Andrea Collier, a member of my new favorite group, SheWrites.  Among a list of questions posed to each student was "what do you see as your biggest obstacle in essay writing?"  I answered that it was in not knowing where I would end up, or less vaguely put, the obstacle looked like a brick wall, behind which hid the answer, the conclusion, the "image" that an essay needed.  I can see the meadow of a general topic; I can see the path of personal experience, the atmosphere of a wider implication of the experience; what I cannot see is the clipped image, the 8 x 10 glossy of the conclusion.  So, I do not begin. 

Happily Ms. Collier told me that I do not need to know.  I need only to begin.  We chatted about my art process and the curtain parted;  easily visible was beginning with the kernel of concept and then, in the writing, both distill and clarify with texture and color - rather like the opposite of how I paint, but viscerally acute.  I begin.

Check back for progress and for other notes on art processes and musings (voices from the Muse)http://www.whitneypeckman-painter.com

Star Ratings Don't Matter: Adjustments and Extended Traveling

Cleaning up some files - found notes on some of our travels (is that travails?) during the 90s.  (I've upgraded again, thanks to Price Line.)

What is that odd shift which occurs when one stays in the same lodging for the third night of an extended trip?  The moment when you turn the key in the lock, or wake in the morning and something in you has made this "home".  A sense of familiarity washes over you.  You drop the key on the table, kick off your thongs and walk barefoot on what was, only a moment before, a cringingly suspect surface, or you roll over, snuggling down in this bed that felt all wrong just last night.  Perhaps the surest sign of all is actually sitting, not hesitantly or gingerly, but with assurance and intention, on that toilet.  Whenever that moment is, one enters into a new state of traveling, affectionately known as "being home", and it is this great reprieve from the work of traveling that allows me to live out of a backpack in a series of strange smelling places for many months at a time, unfettered by desire for my house in America.

 An aside for public transportation.  Admittedly, I do occasionally long for the luxurious spaciousness of my Dodge van with plush seats, enclosed on three sides by privacy, tinted windows, dry and comfortably clean with my own dirt, where my entire length (and that of my husband's) may horizontalize itself without touching another human, knowing that if I roll over it will be an inanimate car wall separating me from possible embarrassment or contamination with god knows what unfamiliar, contagious particle left for me in a manner I cannot bare to ponder.  Steadfastly, I quash those moments of straying from the mysteriously satisfying travel by public conveyance...third class trains, racing night buses, donkey carts, rickshaw, tuk-tuk, bechaks - all riding me along the fanciful edge of death, or minor catastrophe.  Perhaps I intuit that it is that quarter turn toward nostalgia that can threaten my joy in travel.

             In other lands I sleep in the most unlikely of places, covered and not, safe and not, rarely bug or rodent free, and covet the stories those nights breed.  Covered by only a scratchy, odiferous camel blanket in the Tar Desert, I am reassured by my husband squeezed in next to me, and later by the mound of sand blown toward and over us in the night.  Very cozy.  Crowded into a six foot square wooden box of a cabin with one twelve inch square hole with shutter, my husband, son and I roll to the middle of a hammocked mattress, Golden Triangle monsoon turning our space into a sauna. But, in Iowa or Seattle, San Diego or Tucson, I will not turn toward the nostalgia of survival in those other far-flung lands and check into the NoTell Motel. Too much risk of what?  Bedbugs.  Pubic hair.  Athlete's foot.  Crabs.  I do not let go of the sure knowledge gained in high school that one can get crabs from the toilet seat.  Motel 6 is as low end and I go, and as I work my way into my fifties, I feel myself upgrading to Red Roof Inn.  Has there ever been a good story born at a Red Roof Inn?  Reluctantly I check into Motel 6 where just a short time ago, somewhere nearby, in Illinois perhaps, or Georgia, they uncovered a meth lab set up in two adjoining rooms.

Four Stages of Garage Sale Grief

Barnes and Noble shelves are filled with books on grief and grief counseling and, as one who has suffered some socially legitimate grief in her life, I certainly don’t mean to make light of grief in any way, particularly in light of these times when people are once again throwing themselves off bridges and other high places, if only figuratively.  However, I do believe that some consideration needs to be given to Garage Sale Grief since it afflicts so many, regardless of the dearth reported in the media or prayed over on Sundays (or Saturdays or Fridays, for that matter).  So, with utmost respect for the gargantuan range of grief that people are experiencing, I put forth the Four Stages of Garage Sale Grief to promote greater understanding in the populace at large, both the large portion of hunter-gatherers scanning their local and regional papers on Friday’s (and Thursdays’s and Saturday’s for the hard core), mapping our their routes, matching hours of sales with density in given areas, quality of area, distance from starting point and distance from Sale #1 forward through the ten or so sales they hope to get to the next day, and the fewer retailers-for-a-day who are having the Garage Sales (or Yard Sales, though there is a distinction to be made between the Garage Sale and the Yard Sale. I fully acknowledge the validity of the Yard Sale, and have been known to cruise by a few myself of a lazy summer weekend, but herein lies the very distinction itself.  I ask you, can you, in good conscience, equate the Yard Sale event – one for which neighbors or extended families gather together, often with their little urchins racing around the tables of goods, upending those boxes of tattered toys to grab the broken hula hoop, the ragged Curious George, the Godzilla action figures, the red wig that was the very essence of the Little Mermaid, for a resurrection of their tiny memory banks of fun – these rambunctious young families gathering on the green lawn of one or the other, someone starting up the grill, chilling the beer and the sweet tea (substitute Kool Aid, lemonade, sodas for Anywhere, USA), putting out the lawn chairs (NFS of course), some in front of the (possibly for sale) TV plugged by way of multiple extension cords stretched as far from the garage as they will reach, ready for the long leisurely day chatting, occasionally selling the badly cleaned grill, deflated football, odd mismatched glasses, old paperbacks, and cookies (cookies!).  I ask you, does this equate to the bona fide Garage Sale, the rain or shine event which disrupts the very gut of a home, forces complete subjugation of all authentic garage items (cars, trucks, lawn mowers, bicycles, lawn games, man-stuff, etc.) so that days, perhaps weeks, can be spent hauling boxes from the netherlands of the home, examining contents, sorting, choosing, re-sorting, reclaiming and handling endlessly in the arrangement of such items so that they will indicate meaning at the Actual Sale, during which there is room for only one lone attendant, staring at the residue of his or her (but usually her) life, assaulted by memories, to make change for that dollar bill thrust out as the offer on the Mister Coffee (asking $5 - how many dimes, nickels, quarters will I need?)?  Need I say more?  Garage Sale Grief is real and palpable.  Yard Sale Grief?  I don’t think so.

Hereafter we will speak only of the Garage Sale (GS) and with quiet respect, Garage Sale Grief (GSG), and one holding the GS as the Garage Saler.

Of course, the initial or Stage One of GSG, Deciding, starts not with sadness, but rather with either 1) the heartfelt desire to lighten the load, simplify, make a physical/spiritual space in one’s metaphorical Garage/Life or, 2) make some money (which may also achieve #1 if one is very, very fortunate and has excellent Karma). For some, these ostensibly obvious two purposes begin to morph back and forth almost immediately, usually beginning with The Box.  The Box is a professional term used to describe that item, heretofore hidden from daily view, perhaps in an actual box, but more likely put in an attic or basement, hidden behind, stashed away, but certainly forgotten.  Oh, Forgotten!  How soon we forget!  How could we have forgotten!  Don’t you remember when…? 

And so it begins, Stage Two: The Angst of Letting Go.  It is possible, at this point, if one is doing the GS alone, without emotional and tactical support, that paralysis may set it.  It can strike with the speed and power of a new Cuisinart on a Bermuda onion – final, irremediable, forestalling any future plans for the Garage Sale.  The unsuspecting Garage Saler simply cannot deal with the guilt of forgetting, cannot withstand the onrush of poignant memories -tiny fingers pressed into the plaster of paris Mother’s Day gift, the dusky smell of Grandma’s hairbrush, the box of matchbox cars, little plastic hammers and saws, a father’s fedora.  The Saler is lost.  The usual response is to replace the goods (a long sigh, perhaps a few tears, a story or two recalled), close The Box and guilt free, having now cancelled all GS plans, return to the forgetting.  However, should the Garage Saler have been forewarned by a sharp eyed and experienced Garage Saler Guide, this phase can be delicately handled with patience, hugging, an empathetic ear, enabling the grief stricken to gracefully move on to the next stage.

Stage Three: It’s Only Stuff.  (This paradigm shift is critical if one is to not only recover from the GS experience, but to move on to a position of Support For Others embarking on their first GS experience.)  The phrase, “It’s only stuff!” must not be acknowledged by the experienced Guide too quickly lest the Garage Saler think the Guide is making light of the “stuff” in question, and therefore, the whole painful, excruciating exercise.  This can result in anger and a lasting distrust of the friendship.  Tread with care upon others’ memories.  It’s Only Stuff is the transitional stage of GSG, the stage during which the Garage Saler has time (while moving boxes, bins, furniture, pieces of her unexamined life, chunks of her persona, of her history, of her memory, of her successes and fears) to recite the litany of the transition from purpose #1 and 2, mentioned above, to the Truth of It’s Only Stuff.  Momentarily overwhelmed by decisions and memories she can usually accept the Guide’s suggestion that the sorting begin with what can be disposed of (“…just the stuff you really want to throw away…”).  Saler, desirous of comporting herself with dignity, mumbles the new mantra, “it’s only stuff”, as she discards the detritus of that camping trip, old house, school holidays – crushed Coleman stove, torn sweats, cracked pottery lamp, worn out kitchen utensils with melted handles from when she had that gas stove in college, it’s only stuff, kid’s coloring books (whose were they?), unidentifiable metal things (he should have stayed to help me sort this stuff out!), oil paints hardened in the tubes (damn, I wish I’d taken that class..), bird house (ick – stinky), small dressing table chair (oh.  Damn.  Mom’s.  It’s only stuff.  It doesn’t work in this house.  Kids don’t want it.  It’s only stuff, Mom.)  It’s only stuff.  The process may be short, more likely, long.  It requires the sorting through of so much more than the stuff.  The sorting of memory, of feeling, of sadness and joy, all takes time.  And then, in one moment, the window opens and the Garage Saler looks out at her garage full of stuff, and it IS just stuff – beautiful stuff, ugly stuff, useful and useless, reminiscent but no longer redolent of emotion.  A Heart Shift has taken place.  Memories of sadness, anxiety, anger are gone – weighed and found no longer valuable.  The goods are now Just Stuff.  Memories of love, joy, fun, generosity are so alive that the goods representing these emotions pale by comparison – just stuff.

Prepared now to let go, she enters Stage 4: The Sale.  It’s just stuff – stuff that the young couple are so excited to get for $2 for their kitchen, stuff the man collects for his shop, stuff the mom will use to do projects with her children…wonderful stuff, and so cheap!  Aren’t they lucky!

Aren’t I lucky? I love.  I am loved.  I am free.