My husband bought me my very own dremel this Christmas, and I have been furiously grinding and sanding, and realizing that this is not my usual bang it out and be done craft. Shit...what am I doing! I am an ADHD crafter. I want results. So I was beginning to be a bit frustrated at my lack of progress in making my stones shine or have some purpose. I have ground out the color on some of my practice pieces...FAIL.
I don't know what I'm doing, and for me that is not something I am used to as a know it all. When I become enamored with a new hobby or art form, I deep dive. I research, read and watch how to videos. I learn fast and usually within a few weeks or so, I'm an expert. This time it's different. This art form is a slow process. The details of what rock does what and what will bring out what I see in it are still elusive and so I am learning as I go. Trial and error to the 10th degree.
I did finally get the right bit for my dremel and I was able to carve a small bear. A bear! I made it out of opal! It came right out of my brain, through my hands and now it sits on my table. I need to polish and refine it, but it was the first trial where what I see in my head came out into the rock I was working on. SUCCESS!
One thing that makes this different this time is that my husband is not doing his own thing, we are collaborating on what we can do together. His strengths are so different than mine and we might actually create something. We have opened restaurants together, redone entire old buildings and farmhouses. Making art is different than rehabbing old buildings, but it helps to have a partner that can know what you need with just a look. He hovers over my power tool usage, making sure I"m not burning something, setting up my work bench and area. This man, who saved me from so much, now sets me up to be able to create in a way I never thought I would again. This man of mine, takes me children, my crazy family, my hoarding of animals and art supplies and encourages me.
I spent a few years in my early adulthood learning how to silver smith, wax casting, working with wire and metal. I left that ability in the past, but never forgot how it made me feel. Now I am dredging that knowledge out, and looking forward to the access to bigger and better tools in the lab of the society we have joined in order to learn and gain access to the tools that are too big and too expensive for our garage.
All I know is how I disappear into a new hobby, often leaving my family in another headspace, but this time my husband will join me. The prospect of dredging up a new passion and folding into an old skill fills me with hope when the world is on the brink of war. I don't know where this journey will end up, but again, I don't know what I'm doing and I think that is the point the universe needs me to learn. I'm doing it anyway. I have done that my whole life, doing it anyway.
I can't wait to get to creating, and I have so many ideas, I had to buy a new journal to jot designs and ideas, they come and go so fast. I have no idea where this is going, but the journey itself is the point.
From out in the desert grabbing stones from the ground, watching wild horses run, to in my garage taking that dirty lump and either ruining it or carving a polar bear, the journey IS the point. When the world outside is shit, I am so grateful to have the ability to disappear into a passion. It's a privilege I don't take for granted. I Am grateful to not know what I'm doing.
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