So, I was sitting here, minding my own business while watching mindless stuff on TV when the cable signal died. So TV is gone, internet is gone, and brni is in Ashburn, basically gone. I’m all caught up in my various art projects and am too tired to trudge upstairs to start something new.

I read but I’m terribly distracted and can’t figure out a way to settle. The story I’m reading is really well written but I keep drifting off. It’s not the story’s fault–it’s my stupid brain reacting to the unstable weather. I am totally at the mercy of the weather, phases of the moon, planets, stars and dust. It’s rather annoying, but whatcha gonna do?

So, I’m thinking that this is such a cool story, so well written (thank you Elizabeth Bear), that I end up feeling envious. I wish I could write. I mean, write well. As in good. But, aside from (usually) getting the grammar down okay, I’m not even a hack. So I think, why can’t I write? Why can’t I sing (yes, it’s related weirdly in my brain)? What is it that I can do other than complain and put myself down for having no talent whatsoever?

Here’s what I came up with…

I have ideas, thoughts, stories in me but no writer am I. I wish I could spin a good yarn, tell a fine tale, but try as I might, creatively coupling words to engage and transport is not one of my talents. Like singing. I want to but the attempt ends in flat screeches and embarrassing notes.

I make pictures. I draw my stories. I make them out of pulp, graphite, water, oil and earth. My stories are elementals. Things to be peered at, edges to be filled in with someone else’s words, emotions and reactions.

When I talk out loud, I have trouble finding the correct or perfect word. I have never liked talking out loud. I talk in my head — a lot! I’ve learned, as most of us do, how to communicate with others on a day-to-day basis, but that’s not what I’m typing about…

To be heard. understood. sorta. idunno

My method of communicating with the world in any real way, is through pictures. drawings. pen to paper. hand to clay.

My latest attempt to tell a story is to put a face on a skull. Not a real skull of course…a replica of a woman. No age known. No ethnicity. Nothing but a plaster cast of her very basic form. I’m told she’s of the European persuasion, though I’m not good enough–forensically speaking–to really know what I’m doing. I just hope to be sensitive enough to persuade her to reveal herself under my hopeful caress.

*sigh*
this is what happens when i’m bored