Hello again. Thanks for reading these little words that spill out of my mind.

It was a bit of a disjointed holiday season creatively. Energy is spent gathering presents for everyone, there’s navigating relationship conflicts, finding time to put pencil to paper, finding time for self care, making sure your kids have what they need, trying to contribute to household chores when you can, drinking water, getting sleep, and going to therapy because we could all use a bit of therapy these days. Then a couple of days before Christmas my mom fell and fractured her pelvis, so I made the decision to drive 800+ miles to help care for her for a week while her partner was out of state.

It’s difficult to see your once athletic, capable, independent parent suddenly incapacitated, aged, and in pain like that. I took my current pet portrait and drawing tools with me down there, but only managed a couple of hours of progress. It was a very difficult trip emotionally. The effects of it are still resonating in me. With help, I finally identified a measure of grief.

I tell ya….this being human thing is HARD. Being a highly sensitive human is even harder. You feel very big, overwhelming emotions. Relationships are made difficult. Conflict occurs frequently. Your self esteem can suffer. One foot in front the other, right? One day, one hour, one minute at a time.

From this place comes deep regrets about not being financially independent of others. I live with my boyfriend rent-free, I get a small child support payment from my ex-husband, but otherwise I don’t currently make any of my own income. IT SUCKS. And this whole living together thing is rocky. It’s been rocky since the get-go. I wish I could have the option to move out, provide my kids a safe, beautiful, 3 bedroom place of my own….but I can’t. I literally have no choice. I’ve allowed myself to be painted into a financial corner.

Kids, don’t be like me. Save, invest, set financial values and boundaries, pay down debts, live below your means when you’re young, watch your credit, only partner up with people who have healthy finances and don’t want to take advantage of you, take a damn interest in your own finances and those that you share with anyone else, and don’t leave it up to someone else. Why? Because if that partnership/marriage falls apart, your finances can be your way out. Guard that shit like your life depends on it….which it does.

I’m about to turn 44, am divorced, have two kids. I’m financially dependent on others. I have no savings or retirement account. I will probably have to work until I absolutely can’t work anymore. On the bright side, I love drawing. If I can figure out how to get this to take off enough to support myself, then I’ll feel I’ve “made it”, and if I have to keep drawing into my golden years then that might be okay. I hope.

The pet portrait I’m finishing up is called Amazing Larry. It’s a birthday gift to my cousin’s ex-husband’s girlfriend. I’ve never drawn a fuzzy blanket before, so that’s challenging. I made the decision not to film the process for YouTube or Patreon. I may regret not doing that. I’ve taken some progress photos though, and perhaps I can still put them together in a short video with a voiceover of the process.

Lastly, I’ve created Society6 and Redbubble shops. Of course, my imagination runs ahead of me and wishes for hundreds of orders to suddenly start pouring in every day and all this money coming to me. *sigh* Gotta stay grounded in reality and let go of expectations. Progress is progress, no matter how small.

Thanks for reading.

Two days from now the yoga studio I bought at the beginning of the pandemic is closing. It was the first business I’ve ever purchased or run, and boy did I not know what I was doing. Still…I took a chance at a time when other studios were closing their doors, I hated my retail job, I was finishing up my yoga teacher training, and I thought maybe I’ll get lucky.

I purchased it from two experienced, well-to-do women who knew way more about yoga and leadership than I did. Even further back there had been a third owner to share the responsibilities. So it went from three to two to one: three minds, two minds, one mind. And a very full single mind it came to. I’m in my 40s, a single mom to two kids, no financial security whatsoever, was trying desperately to finish up yet grieve the longest divorce ever, started a new relationship, and in therapies to work through the rawness that is my existence.

I’m sad I couldn’t make the yoga thing work for me, the yoga teachers, or the students. BUT, if I zoom out a bit, I’m actually relieved to be done with it. With my boyfriend Mike’s support I’m turning toward my illustration. It’s painstakingly slow-going, I’m super undisciplined with my time and attention, loads of self-doubt hangs in the air, and I am prone to impatience. Great start, huh?

I’ve created a little space by a window in our bedroom for my wobbly drafting table that I got secondhand from my Pappaw, some shelves, drawers, a cork board, and several lights. Someday I’ll have a proper studio. For now, this is good.

On my table at the moment is a sketch based on a typo my mom’s friend wrote on a Facebook comment. The person meant to type “Heart wrenching” but instead wrote “Heart ranching.” So my mom commissioned me to draw a scene depicting “heart ranching.” It’s taking me waaay too long to work on it. I had to look up all sorts of images of ranching, ranches, corrals, cowboys, horse breaking, rodeos, Texas ranches, prickly pear, and 2 point perspective. I’m using a blue non-photo pencil for laying it all out, and I’m not even sure what I’ll use over that. Ink? Colored pencil? Marker? The only thing cartoony about it is the hearts, which I’m drawing in place of horses in a corral. Otherwise I’ve chosen to be somewhat realistic with the look of the fencing, people, barn, trees, and landscape. Hopefully it translates well, and my mom likes the end result. It’s just for fun though, then I need to return to my Minnesota bird series, of which I’ve only completed TWO.