Fifth?

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Done?  No… I spelled “fifteen” wrong.  And I’m not thrilled with the beads stuck under “fifthteen” either.

So, next step is to scrape all that off…  geez.

This is called “Art Grows in Youngstown” and it is one of two tiles going artsy in a public art project for the 15th YSU Festival of the Arts.

Maybe I ought to stick with numbers?

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Shrinking into Me

Who is that person who kind of looks like me? 

As I stare at the image in the photograph, a strange thing starts to happen.  I begin to expand.  I begin to feel the dimensions of my body, bare my own weight.  It feels puffed like a overblown balloon about to burst.  Or a surgical glove.  Pop!  Air into fingers.  So much pressure swelling outward.  I don’t like it.

I study the photograph.  Where’s my sharp chin line? My skinny neck?  The dent between my collar bones?  How can this be?  That’s not what I see in the mirror. 

The swelling into myself continues.  Oompa or is it umpha?  Please Mr. Wonka, please, oh please ask your little friends to roll me to the juicer.  I can’t stand this anymore.  It feels awful.

Do I really look like that?  It looks like I haven’t lost an ounce, must less 72 pounds.  Oh sheez… people are asking me all these stupid questions about my weight loss so this is obviously smaller than it was before?  Oh gosh, what did I look like before?

That sexy lace trimmed shirt looks… matron-ish on me.  I felt like how the model looked when I put it on.  What was I thinking? 

It took several days to feel like me again.  When I feel like me, I look like me, the me only I can see.  The image is not toothpick thin, so it is not too far removed from reality. 

I don’t understand how this happens.  It is more than an optical illusion because I can feel it.  I don’t “live” inside my entire body. 

I signed up for five sessions of cognitive behavior therapy to help me stop bingeing.  The objective has been met, yet therapy has resumed and shall continue as I’ve got to learn how to deal with some things that I never really learned how to deal with before.

The questions make me feel exposed.  It is not a secret anymore.  Someday, the symptom of excess weight will be all gone, then the world will see what I see in the mirror.  I cannot imagine my inner self skrinking as my body shrinks so I am thinking the image thing will merge with reality when my actual physical dimensions reflect with how I see myself in the mirror.  I don’t know yet.  Guess we will find out.

Thanks for reading.

Making Posies

I can’t leave the flowers alone.

Okay, the only thing I did “at home” was replace the couple wraps of thin wire holding the posies stems together with a tight wrap of heavier wire. Everything else (except soldering under the seed beads) was done last night while hanging out on the wide sidewalk in front of Metamorphosis Gallery in downtown Struthers.

I hope it is okay to go UP because this “floral arrangement” is going on a tile provided by Art Youngstown, Inc. for the public art project to be displayed at the YSU Summer Festival of the Arts in mid-July.

I picked up two tiles yesterday (the other one will be a flat mosaic using the copper elements shown last post), then raided my studio for supplies with ideas churning while watching the clock so I could hop the next bus out of here to Metamorphosis.

I am a member now, with full access to the shared studio space 24/7. The light there is oh, so much better than this “cave” called home. Sometimes, we drag tables, easels, whatever outside the storefront and work on the sidewalk. It is a busy street corner, a main intersection near three popular dining establishments, so it is like making art in public. People stop by to talk, check out the art, wave when they drive by… it’s all cool.

Found objects, re-purposed objects, recycled… (forget the exact wording) is “strongly encouraged” so my flowers are made out of old bulb end copper plumbing tube things with floral petal looking lamp parts, copper wire in various guages, leftover beads and Swarvoski crystals.

I told a friend that I would finish it at Metamorphosis as she wants to see how I do it, so I’m going to pack it up with whatever tools & supplies might be needed for what comes next, then finish it there.

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