Dragons for Rosie

Liberación Eufónica del Dragón de Rosie
Euphonious Deliverance of Rosie's Dragon

Progress Since High School (thank goodness!)

I felt like sharing some artwork from high school for those of you who aren't familiar with it. I drew this one when I was 15, just after returning from an AFS Summer Study Abroad in Italy. At the time, it was my way of expressing the feeling of being unable to communicate with another person because of a world of difference, including language, that stood between us. It wasn't referring to any one person, but to every person I met. When I returned home I had reverse-culture shock, which was something I was completely unprepared for. Suddenly, communicating with good old friends became like trying to speak to the Italians. We just weren't speaking the same language anymore.

After progressing on through high school with many frustrations and growing impatience, I ended up married and then divorced - many more failed attempts at communication. At that point I had even lost my ability to communicate through art. I wanted to re-learn how to draw and was encouraged by my good friend, Joel, when we agreed to have a show together at Good Thyme, where we both worked. As I was unable to create anything new, I revamped my old stuff by adding titles, words that related old pieces to my current state of being. The titles didn't stop at one word, but included the dictionary definition of the word. This piece was then titled:

Pidgin: a mixed common second language:

a simplified language made up of parts of two

or more languages, used as a communication tool

between speakers whose native languages are different

This piece could easily be interpreted in this way as the expressions from each person meld together in the middle to create a familiar image...

These days, it has taken on another meaning for me. it represents our ability to transcend language [as we know it] in communication. So much can be said to another with energy, body language, and even just by listening to the silence. This pidgin includes the language of the universe, one that we all know and use whether we are consciously aware of it or not. When I went to Guatemala in February I was on a lone voyage, forced to communicate without a common language or background. What I found was that I made deeper connections with people in one week than ever before. And we are still in touch. Communication can be more meaningful when words stay out of the way, when language and grammatical correctness become irrelevant.

Now, in the Art of Peace program I am in, we are learning new words, new sounds that are energy sounds, new ways to communicate through different areas of existence. I hold the words of Martin Prechtel:

“To the Spirit, the noise of the humans was just about

the same size as a mockingbird’s song, or a cricket’s chirp;

we weren’t that big to them.”

This is my reminder that not only is mine not the only voice, not the only language, but we are also not the only ones who hear it. It also has another meaning to me: that mine is not the only language I can hear. As I hear the cricket, I can hear all of my relations. As I stop in the city street to listen to the birds sing when no one else seems to notice, I can hear my guides. I have only to listen. Sometimes "listening" means picking up my pencils and letting the creative energies of the universe flow through me to create an image that speaks more meaning than many words could express.

This is what happens to me when I create artwork: I am simply listening to another form of language, creating a new living pidgin, translating a message into a tangible form.