What qualifies as art? or What do my black raspberries have to do with my life as an artist?

I've named this blog my life as an artist because that's who or what I really feel I am. I really believe I am an artist and I have always felt that way. I am not using a specific medium at the moment although I have concentrated on painting over the last few years. Unfortunately, I have not painted in over a year due to a variety of reasons which I won't get into at the moment. One part of being an artist, a large part, is what is going on in one's consciousness when engaged in any activity. Which brings me to my berry experience. As many citizens of the post industrial revolution, urbanized, technology-driven world we live in, I feel I have lost touch with nature. Picking berries in my own backyard was pretty exciting.
As I was checking each berry for worms, I began to feel a connection to my hunter-gatherer ancestors. I began to feel a particular connection to my gatherer ancestors who I believe, based on various readings I have done on the origins of agriculture, were most likely the women and children of the mesolithic and neolithic eras. I wondered where I was finding the patience to inspect each berry individually and why I seemed to be getting a certain amount of satisfaction from this monotonous activity. An image of a mesolithic woman doing exactly the same thing came to me. Or could it have been a modern-day woman who still survives from this type of activity? Is this type of patience a trait that has been passed down from ancient times? Is it a trait that is more common amongst females than males? Yesterday, my attention was engaged in a similar way while sorting through my daughter's Barbie dolls and accessoires and I felt the same sort of satisfaction.

Weird.

My next post will have to deal with my Barbie experience. Stay tuned.

Berry important news from Mel K

So there I was the other day, seated comfortably and taking in the sun in my miniature backyard, or back garden for the Brits. I look over towards the compost bin and see this enormous plant with pointy leaves and thorns and little berries growing behind it! The berries look like blackberries, my favourite berry. I pick a bunch and eat them without washing them first. Yum! I pick another handful. Before stuffing this bunch into my mouth, however, I notice something moving on the surface of one of the mystery berries. It's an itsy bitsy little worm. Suddenly I can feel worms squiggling round inside my tummy. Yuck. My boyfriend 'I grew up on a farm so I am an expert on harvesting fruit and stuff' Yvon tells me to soak them in water for a while until all the worms float to the surface. I am doubtful about this but I soak them in a bowl of water all day anyway. In the evening, I don't see any worms floating. I drain the berries and we eat them. I feel a little queasy thinking that I may have ingested a few more mini worms and larvae.

Today I picked about a quart of these berries. (see pic from internet here http://media.photobucket.com/image/a%20quart%20of%20berries/Garden_Of_Eve/blackcaps0707071.jpg - I'm too lazy to take my own pics today.)
I washed them all and inspected each berry individually. About a third contained little clusters of worm larvae. Ew. I am soaking them all again in two separate containers, one for the worm-infested and the other for the group which supposedly contains no worms... I am waiting to see if any worms float to the surface, particularly in the group of berries that I know to contain worms. If no worms float to the surface, then I can prove that I was right and Yvon was wrong...one of my favourite pastimes.
In the meantime, I have discovered that the berries are in fact, black raspberries, which are not often grown commercially and therefore hard to come by. For more info: http://www.uga.edu/fruit/rubus.html Too bad the worm issue has dampened my enthusiasm and my appetite. On the other hand, my admiration for fruit farmers has increased.

Why blog?

OK I have been waking up for the last few months with many many many thoughts that I have wanted to write down. Instead, I get up, pee, make coffee, speak to my family members, wash dishes, prepare and consume meals, go teach my students, at least from August to May, make phone calls, check my email, pay bills, drive places doing errands, go to the gym, go for walks, read the newspaper....then it's the end of the day and I still haven't written anything down except grocery lists and short emails or comments on my friends' Facebook pages. It's not enough. I have written morning pages as suggested by Anne Cameron , or is it Julie, whatever, I've done the morning pages stuff several times and nothing.



So because I seem to not be able to stay away from my computer even when it is sunny and 26 degrees C outside, I have decided to start a blog. I would like to write, I would like to paint, I would like to make music but I think I have a hard time with the lonely feeling that creeps up on me as I engage in these activities. Yes, I'm a bit of a weiner and a whiner. I need attention. So if I think even if one person reads this, I will be motivated to write. And the more I write, the more I will become unblocked as an artist. So here goes nothing. Welcome to my blog.