Who Knew?

As you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you will be familiar with the 5 Stages of Grief Journal I have been working on for the last six months. I added this ‘label’ to the cover which includes my father’s name in both ink and bleach. It helps identify the front of the journal. The edges are actually a recycled piece of ribbon that previously hung off a Japanese door bell we have on our back deck. As the ribbon had degraded it was a perfect addition to the total label.

I have been creating a piece of calligraphy, everyday, for more than two years for this blog. I am less than thirty pieces away from one thousand…holy cow! As I look back on the work I have done, the pieces I have created and the creative twists and turns I have traveled in order to reach my goal, I am astounded by the volume and different tools, elements and topics I have employed. It has been a long term project, which has kept me busy and thinking for years. This journal is another long term project, yet it has served a different purpose. It has helped us process through our grief through words and colors, textures and experiments. Other people who have read it to help themselves process through their own grief have found it a real blessing. The front of the journal invites people into an opportunity to read how others are feeling, have felt, and how they will feel as they process through their own grief. Who knew calligraphy could do all that?

What started out feeling like a selfish couple of goals, fill a journal and create work each day, have become a habit and welcomed use of my time. I have not always sat down to solid ideas. A majority of the time I sat at my table not knowing what I would create, yet knew I had to create to keep my goals moving. Lots of work went in drawers and may never see the light of day. Other work is still in process, and hundreds and hundreds of pieces are in blog posts being read by people across the globe.

Who knew? And I still have more to go, twenty-five to be exact. On March 20, 2023 I will post my one thousandth piece. Stay tuned, I plan to do a last ten count down as I reflect and share lessons learned that you will be able to apply to your own goals and dreams. Thank you for reading…more too come!