Creating Keys

I feel a bit as though, at the beginning of the pandemic, Fear ran through the hallways of my soul, slamming all the doors shut.  Each clanged closed with a resounding thud, as the locks slid into place.  

My first work was to face down the Fear gremlin.  (The telling of that story will have to wait for another day).  Once I had evicted the Fear, I needed to go about opening up the doors again.  That has proven to be fairly tricky business.  The doors, it turns out, are pretty sticky once shut.

In my struggle to get back to these various recesses of myself, my mind has wandered back to some words I wrote years ago, when I was first beginning to make art.  I struggled a lot with finding a sense of permission to make art.  At the time, my thinking went like this:

I finally made an important distinction.  I was operating under this crazy myth that's been tripping me up.  I had some misconception that Art lived behind some sort of locked door.  Some lucky few people were given a key to that door.  I don't know if this was a bequest at birth, or maybe somewhere in the Art corridors in High School.  It may have come as late as Art school.  It's hard to say about these things when you're on the outside. 

And that's the pernicious danger about this myth.  In it, Art was inextricably beyond my reach.  I didn't have the key.  In this myth, there are two distinct groups of people:  those who do Art and those who do not.  There is no cross over between the groups.  In fact, I'm not even clear on whether or not there was any self selection between the two groups.  You are either one of the artistic ones or you're not.

But, putting my pen to the paper has clarified things for me.  There is no such thing as artistic people.  To create is innately human.  I'm allowed to do Art.  You're allowed to do Art.  This is an important proclamation, so I don't want to understate it.  You are allowed.

This is freeing.  This is exhilarating, this permission.  But there is still one more piece to this equation.  Yes, absolutely, Art is available to everyone.  But, then, what of that gap that exists between what I want to create when I sit down with a blank page, and what I can create?  That can't be ignored.  That gap is where this misconception about "artistic" and "non-artistic" people comes from in the first place.

It turns out that there is a key after all.  But, it isn't secretly handed to any select group of people.  That key is crafted by each individual.  I can create one of my own.  It is crafted by going back to the brushes and pencils over and over again.  It is created by learning the skills, tools and techniques artists use.  It is forged by every attempt to improve, to apply what I've learned, and see what I'm still missing.

It’s encouraging—this promise of forging my own key for whatever skill I want to pursue.  I still believe in that basic premise.  It’s just that there are a few new wrinkles, now that I’m standing in a corridor surrounded with locked doors.  They haven’t all flown open at once, the way they slammed closed.  I have to address each one individually.  

I was a bit surprised that the door I managed to access first was art.  This was a great mystery to me, since it’s been in my life for the least amount of time.  But, maybe my theory of key making can explain it.  The muscle memory of creating that key was still fresh.  I knew how to do it because I’d had to intentionally fabricate one before.

Slowly, next, the writing returned.  A bit choppy at first.  But, with time and repeated exposure, I’m able to put words to paper again.  Then, I began to read again.  I started to Wander (within the tightened constraints available to me right now).  And, at last, I was able to see into most of the corridors and recesses of my being.

There is, though, one door that remains maddeningly closed to me.  It’s the one that houses the Maker part of my soul.  I’ve tried to trick it into coming out to play by project hopping and stopping mid-thought.  These might afford me a momentary glimpse behind the door.  But, it remains frustratingly shuttered.

I’m finally realizing that this key is going to be the toughest to create because I’ve never made one in my living memory.  That door has never felt closed to me.  From the moment I could manipulate my world, I was making something or another: from barbie doll clothes, self-drafted clothing, quilts of every ilk to camping equipment. With a confidence that often outstripped my ability, I have always been certain that, particularly if it involved fabric and thread, I could make it.

Age and experience have taught me a little humility.  But, they have also revealed what I’m capable of with time.  I know there is still a Maker inside of me.  And so, I will have to return to my key-making practice.