When I say, the title of my next book will be “Everything I Need

to Know in Life I Can Learn In Art Class,” I am not kidding.

Marilyn said, Don’t waste paint. Don’t waste anything.

A make-do life becomes a make-art life as I paste sequins in my

altered artist journal and begin to define what I am thinking.

Do I define what I’m thinking before the fact or after the fact?

This begins my ambiguous tour through the maze of not

what is there to learn, but what I want to learn. Take what you can

and apply it to what you want. Joyce said, don’t let them lead you

astray. I can see that I will have to make the list of teachers in the

front of my book longer since my friend Joyce becomes my teacher

by suggesting the use of metal leaf on my sequins. Before making

art my life art, I would not have taken her suggestion seriously.

Now it’s yes, yes, yes, teach me, teach me, teach me. Arturo said,

bring what you are already doing to class. Jim said, keep it

personal. How can so many people say the same thing and it be

so difficult to understand? Do you really want to know why

I put sequins in my book? It is survival. It is tedious. I want it tedious.

What do you worry about, Mom? Johnny’s only 13. Of course

he has no idea. I am old. When I was a young mother, I didn’t worry.

Now, I know too much. Seen too much. Done too much.

I paste sequins in my journal. Tedious. The mind cannot worry

when choosing a color combination for sequins. The mind cannot worry

on the ambiguous tour through art, ambiguous art, where excitement

and adventure live. Life is predictable. Art is ambiguous. We know

where life goes. All over the place. And sometimes the colors smear.

I slow down. I don’t turn the page so fast. I said, if you were to smoke

pot and I’m not saying it’s OK, but, if you were, I’d like to think

you were responsible, like not smoking before school.

published in Trash to Treasure

https://www.trashtotreasurelit.com/search?q=laverne%20zabielski

Laverne Zabielski

Journal