Things I drew this week pt. 3
in the beach house of my mind
~too long for email—read in browser~
woof. this last week, two weeks (what is time?) have found me moldering. the urge to create is very present, but taking action feels like slogging through deep mud—I have barely picked up a pencil. Even now, i was intending to sit down and scribble but... CUT TO: i’m tapping away at the keyboard. My sketchbook is sitting on the dresser across the room, i’m trying not to make eye contact. I can feel it’s green cloth *tsk tsk tsk*ing at me.
On a more productive note, I started a new plant medicine program this week—my first since like 2018—and it’s got me all kinds of excited. I love it all—the first day jitters, learning everyone’s names and faces, the anticipation of the changes I’ll see in myself by the end of the course, inhabiting a space with folks who share a common interest, community, greater knowing, learning stories…
This program in particular gets my fur up because its decidedly the least clinical herbal education I’ve received. There will be no memorizing scientific names, no asking “what is this plant good for?” (*shudder*), not even really any medicine making. Even after the first meetup, I’m not entirely sure what I’m in for—the class is literally called ‘mystery school’—but I’m hoping for: transcendence, portals, transformation, depth. I’m hoping that getting to know the plant realm in an entirely new and esoteric way will crack something open inside me and leave me changed in a surprising way. In short, I’m hoping to encounter magic.
I cant wait to see what new threads develop between me and the plant world and my creative practice and the great unknown.
Anyway, here are some marks I arranged on paper in an attempt to please my soul:
[void vibes]
disjointed thoughts that I can’t extrapolate into an entire essay because I’m okay at drawing but less okay at writing.
- Something really clicked for me a few months back when I read a flower medicine recommendation for “channeling power and creative energy which may be misdirected into aggression”. It was suddenly so clear to me why my stuck-feeling creativity was beginning to feel more like a festering body infection, something that I urgently needed to lance and bleed.
So, idk, maybe if you’re also an angry rude jerk a lot of the time, try exploring some creative outlets? It's helped. So did the flower medicine (snapdragon flower essence, in case you need some).
- i’m searching for some void vibes. Something real but uncanny. Something “oops I slipped into a new dimension”. Not sure yet how to achieve this yet, but have been thinking that a good way to set the scene is by revisiting Welcome to Night Vale. I love so much about it—the radio program format, the desert-gothic setting, the immersiveness that develops after listening for a while. So good, so void-y. The internet oracle also led me here, which I’m not sorry about.
[frivolous & good]
Harmony Korine & Jurgen Teller; William Eggleston 414
I’m a big sucker for coffee table books, and this one ranks v high on my wish list right now. The mashup of these artists + an aimless, amorphous roadtrip through the summer south—muah. Gimme gimme.
Its unfortunately out of print, so for now the online images are sustaining me.
I’ve been mixing up my musical realm by seeking out new sources, and have been especially delighted by WBFO lately. Last week they did an hour of nonstop Clash, and yesterday I heard a ska version of Come On Eileen. I spent the bulk of my 20s living in Buffalo and having a really great time about it, so the extra dose of nostalgia doesn’t hurt.