9×12  class study w/ blk, wht, and yellow ochre.  I finished it in 3 hours and like it.

 

I like to drive. I like to drive for hours at a time on highways with limited traffic and good music playing. Alone is best. I live my real life when I’m driving alone in a car.
When I was young I would have conversations with people in the mirror. Not that I saw imaginary people in the mirror, but I could see myself having the conversations I could or would never have with the people I wished or needed to talk to.  I had some really good stories to tell, arguments to make, or desperate pleas to save my fragile life.   My words were usually well received.  At least, that’s how they played out.  Even when I cried, it was good to say everything I wanted to say to the one I could never say it to.

Driving is a better forum for such talk.  I don’t need to see myself to believe it’s me anymore.  I just need to hear the words come out of my mouth.  The words, the tears, the meanings are all authentic.  The real me…

Driving long distances with good music playing can be one of the most rejuvenating experiences.  Hugely effective against the pains and toils of life. I can be so immersed in the songs and my thoughts and the stories that whirl around my head, the hours and miles speed by.  And I feel good.  Really good.  Even if I’m crying.  It’s only the cries of my stiffening bones that make me pull over.  Or my bladder…

Music is essential for long distance driving because it causes me to reflect on my life as it is, was, and could be.  Just another form of self-awareness. Some music brings forgotten memories to life, to be relived again borne of the melodies that hold so much meaning for me. Music, perhaps more than art, is the universal language of humanity.  It can touch your heart in the deepest way.  I wish I was a musician, but instead I’m stuck being a tortured wanna-be artist who loves to drive.

If there was one thing I hope for, it would be to create art that can touch a heart deeply.  Again and again.  Like the song you never get tired of listening to; or the one that makes you cry every time; or the one that could have been written for you specifically.  I hope I can create art that someone wants to take home and ponder.  Art that makes someone come alive in some way every time they look at it.

Last week, I moved my third son four hours away into his first apartment situation.  It’s a nice distance.  The traffic was light both ways.  I drove up and back in one day and really liked my time alone, singing and crying and dancing in my seat.  I sometimes wonder if other drivers ever notice me.  Surely other people feel the way I do.  About driving, about music, about life…

I get so afraid. I must keep trying even after bad days.  I need to be more careful not to sabotage myself.   I have become a master at that.  I can be ruthless.  The good thing is, I drive a lot and I use that time to talk myself out of giving up.