Strange Child...

     I was thinking today on the first time I remember having an inclination to art. I was six or seven, living in a trailer park with my family, I remember sitting in our yard next to the sidewalk in front of an old milk crate making these masks. I had a few rolls of aluminum foil, a coffee can of random objects like buttons, pennies, thimbles, nuts and beads a jar of glitter and a few bottles of glue. Making the masks with all of my little objects and selling them for a few pennies to people who passed by.

     It was ridiculous really, thinking about it now but I was planning to get rich selling my masks. I was so confident in my ability I actually ran away from home that same day. My mother, step-dad and siblings had all gotten in the car and left for what I thought was for good. I took my jar of pennies, a couple dollars I think and walked away from my business, planning to make my way to Kentucky. On my way I decided to stop and acquire some provisions which from what I remember was a brown paper sack of green beans and an Ice Cream cone. Somehow I’d lost my shoes during my journey and wrapped a shirt around my feet to go into McDonalds for my ice cream. Dumping my jar of pennies onto the counter I sorted through the buttons and screws trying to remember how to count change and the teenager behind the counter decided that my Ice Cream should be free. I sat down at a booth making sure to keep my feet covered, I was afraid they’d kick me out because I wasn’t wearing shoes, and ate my Ice Cream, while counting my pennies to avoid further embarrassments. Taking stock of my supplies, my dirty old foot shirt, some supplies to make more masks, a can of pennies and my sack of green beans I felt confident of my ability to make it to Kentucky and set out again, walking by the Riverside Police station on my way.

     I crossed a busy street, walked up the on ramp to route 4 and was quickly apprehended by a Police officer. He knelt down in front of me and picked me up asking me just where I thought I was going, I told him the zoo, so that my parents wouldn’t get in trouble for leaving me and going to Kentucky (they actually went to the grocery store) He put me in his car, gave me some crackers or cookies or something just in time to see a hysterical woman running up the on ramp (my Mother) following leads from people who had seen a dark skinned little girl with a can of pennies making her way to Kentucky. He asked her if she’d lost a little girl and she ran faster, saw me in the car and I really think she almost fainted. I’ll remember that spanking for the rest of my life, but I deserved it.

    Later that day my grandmother put me in the bath to sooth my bleeding legs and took all my art supplies away. Art was dangerous for me at that point, and they weren’t going to let me keep doing it since it had already caused so much trouble. I didn’t actually know what art was, but I knew that I liked it, that it was dangerous and that it scared my family to death.

and so it began.

On my way to Chicago

A few weeks ago I spent the weekend in one of the greatest cities in the world Chicago. While I was there I decided that during the spring and summer of 2011; I’m going to be staying in Chicago; working as a volunteer with an outreach on the north side of the city. Explaining this choice to my family is incredibly difficult not because the benefits are hard to find, but because I would be the only member of our family to go so far from home. I have multiple reasons for making this decision, none of them I’ve taken lightly. The amount of opportunity as an artist alone is enough to make me want to pack my bags and leave tonight, but there are other reasons, some of them obvious, others not so much. I as a person, an artist and a Christian looking to live in the way Jesus said to, am a much better match for a city like Chicago than I ever will be for Dayton.

As an artist walking the streets of Chicago is an experience to be cherished. The architecture, open studios, art galleries and street artists provide more creative stimulus for me in one hour than the art scene of Dayton provides in a month. Art in Chicago is everywhere, artists are everywhere and though the competition in a city the size of Chicago is fierce, the average artist cannot deny a heart that pants after such a creative lifestyle as Chicago can offer. The city is to me as an artist what a sunset is to a man who can see for the first time. A thing of awe and beauty that reminds me I’m alive and of what I was put here to do.

As a 30 year old woman, there are few places in the United States that can offer such hope for a new start as the city of Chicago can. I’ll be going to Chicago right around the time of my 30th birthday starting a new decade in a new city forming a new life. I’ve lived here in Dayton my entire life, I was born at Miami Valley, raised in the city and so far I’ve been content. Somehow though the thought of turning 30 has shaken me from my sedated comfort and made me look at life in a different way. Have I stayed in Dayton for 29 years because I’ve really wanted too, or because I’ve been afraid to take a chance? That question is jolting, but one that most of humanity will ask themselves in one form or another. This introspection has revealed a numb contentment in my life that I had been able to write off for years as the American way.

We live in a blinding comfort and like rats in a maze, we take the path well trodden knowing that even if it’s dull, numbing and lifeless it’s safe. The days turn into weeks, the weeks turn into years and we sit up at night wondering where our lives have gone. I personally don’t plan on living this way, at least, not any longer. That now or never urgency has crept into my mind leaving its mark on the backs of my eyelids. I would rather have a single season of voyage and risk creating unforgettable memories, than years of dreary existence living vicariously through the television set.

As a Christian Chicago is a city full of broken hearts. Millions of them, in a city as fast paced and quick tempered as Chicago is known to be the number of broken and lonely people seems almost uncountable. The old, the poor, the wretched and the depressed are found everywhere in all walks of life. These are the people, the kind of people that Jesus spent his time with, the poor pitiful souls doing just what they can to survive another day. Dayton has no shortage of people like these, though living among them for so long I’ve found myself growing apathetic to the plights of these people. Seeing the same faces and hearing the same stories for years on end inevitably has that affect on a person, but the life purpose of a Christian is to serve and love. There are times when a change is necessary just to continue, serving as a reminder that all the hurt and lost have not been found, all the blind don’t yet see and that the harvest is still plentiful. “The poor have suffered enough” is what the sign post in front of the ministry center I’ll be staying at reads. The poor have suffered enough.

In summary as an artist, a 30 year old woman, and a Christian Chicago is my city. My family will learn to accept my choice, even though they won’t understand at first. Keeping oneself locked into the same old patterns and expecting different results is a foolish way to live one’s life. I’m counting the weeks until I leave in March and feeling the change begin like water swirling around my feet, and learning to embrace the waves that will soon carry me away. A quote from my favorite movie states my feeling more clearly than I can explain, so that’s how I’ll end.

“I find that I’m so excited I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. I think it’s the excitement that only a free man can feel, a free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain.” ~Ellis Redding, The Shawshank Redemption.