I made these pieces in December during my last few weeks as a member at Urban Art Co-op. I wanted to do something special for Valentine’s Day and I was thinking about how this particular holiday hits for different people and our understanding of love. Of course, it’s me so I can’t just do something simple and gushy and typical. Here’s some thoughts circulating around the themes of this series. Love is complicated!!! 

We understand love in so many ways. As a feeling. Something that waves over us towards another person or thing. Affection, admiration, desire. It encompasses all but doesn’t decidedly present as mutually exclusive to any one feeling.

Love is a choice. Sometimes the feeling of love can’t be chosen but the movement and closeness of love is always available to me through choice. I can use the lens of love in how I view myself, the world and the people around me. It might be hard on certain days to choose to shift towards love. 

I so often conflate the action of love with control. To make my surroundings and life more pleasant to me by coercing things to be more of what I want. But that isn’t choosing love. Showing love involves acceptance which starts with paying attention. How could I truly love myself and others if I’m living in a fantasy of what could be? Who am I today? How do I need to be seen by myself and loved right in the arrivals, in betweens, endings, and beginnings of my life? I can change, sure. But love doesn’t change me because it sees a better version of me somewhere out there…it changes me because love inspires, fills and nurtures. That kind of love isn’t coercive or manipulative, it’s just the sheer nature of generative growth.

As a single person I often think about what sort of love I’m waiting for. What sort of love I have available to me that maybe I’m not noticing. What sort of love I need to be prepare myself to give. One of the problems I see in my own heart is how distracting it can be to think you don’t have the love you need or want. How it limits your presence of what is right in front of you. 

Maybe you are heartbroken. Maybe your marriage is really hard. Maybe your love rejected you. Maybe you rejected you. Maybe your parents didn’t love you. Maybe someone you love is gone now and there’s a gaping hole left. 

Remove breakups and divorces and rejection from the timeline and there’s still a million things in the world that can break my heart. If my eyes and heart are truly open I can get lost in the heartbreak. It feels daunting to continue putting yourself out there with hope and anticipation that your love will be received or be reciprocated. But love requires trust and openness that its timing is never off. Aren’t we seeing that in the face of brutality right now? The power of a love that doesn’t give up. The power of a love that will fight for the voiceless, the oppressed and the betrayed. I think that love is there for those of us who have dealt with personal heartbreak too. If we choose to not give up, the love we still have shows up for the wounded parts of us. 

This is a little phrase that I’ve said a lot to myself when I’m in LA. The sunshine and flowers and fragrant ripe citrus. I’ve always tended to finesse or create my surroundings to fit my desires instead of the other way around. For the first time in my life I chased my desire to a new place. But I always have held a belief that I can build a life I love anywhere. And anywhere life takes me I want to be able to say…”I love it here.” In this body, in this home, with these people, in this town. On this precious earth.

I’ve been randomly drawn to the Nasturtium lately for some reason and it became clear when I arrived in LA. It’s a plant that always grows here. You can find it in yards, on the floor of a forest…cascading down the rock wall of a bar patio. Over the years during my visits to LA I have seen it as a beacon of the ever blooming family of plants in this sunny southern climate. It’s a plant that is familiar to me as a gardener but only seasonally. It called to me as I planned to move south and now I’m surrounded by its comforting circular leaves. 

The geese in this collection are the last tiny geese I will be making! I’ve moved on to tiny chairs. So, if you’ve been wanting an emotional support goose, please do not delay. I named them all for you.

I’m donating 15% of all my online sales during February to SCAR (Spokane Community Against Racism) who has, for years, been actively advocating for important causes in my hometown, Spokane. They have done the work to establish themselves in the fight against white supremacy and fascism in the community. When I think of what we are up against right now, I look to organizations like this who are leading the way and I want to support their very real, tangible work. And I also want to put my money where my heart is. Because that is love too.

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I’m living in Pasadena with my dog Ana. We are nice and settled in, exploring and enjoying all the sunshine. Truly. Not having seasonal depression is…well…life changing. 

I’ve been out seeing some live music, visiting the ocean and finding nature trails to explore. And…I got into a new pottery studio and hit the ground running! I love it so much. I’m making lots of new things and planning my market schedule for the year. I’m also helping out a bit at a very amazing small venue in Pasadena called Healing Force of the Universe. It’s been really nice to have a spot to be around the music community. I miss my community in Spokane, but this is a really great place for me to be right now. 

Thank you for reading!