create

what can i do? what can i say?

| Sheree

Unconsciously I set myself the task of being creative everyday. A good way of marking this practice, was and still is, turning up here on this blog and posting something. Anything. A word, a quote, an image, an essay, an epiphany.

Some days, I’ve not had the time or energy or bandwidth to create anything, other days when I’ve felt this way, I’ve still turned up and done something. Anything. I’ve wanted to bring in some consistency within a world where consistency is irrelevant and pointless in the grand scheme of things. When the world is on fire, when Palestinians are dying of starvation and gunfire. When anti-immigration riots erupted once more in the UK. When tropical storms kill people in the Philippines. And when Syria returns to bloodshed. The list could go on of more countries and peoples around the world suffering at the hands of others, who do not see them as human or care about them.

I get sick of hearing the news. Watching the news. Seeing the headlines. I look away. I look away because I can and then chastise myself for dong so. There’s something in witnessing it all, even though it hurts my soul. What can I do? What can I say?

I get frustrated with all the hypocrisy I witness. The double standards. The lack of justice. People saying we’re doing this to them because we’ve been persecuted for so long so have a right, or are justified in persecuting other people now. I’m a white man and I rape women and children, but I’m protesting about (illegal) immigrants coming over here and raping our women and children. Everything is operating within this world to keep a few in power and wealth at the expense of other people deemed inferior and dispensable.

I hate hate. I can’t stand it. I see it in the screwed up faces of people hauling abuse at vulnerable people. It’s been there within the marrow of their bones for centuries. Grown white adults, hurling abuse at little black children. Not seeing them as children but as beasts, beasts to destroy. It breaks my heart and disgusts me, but what can I say? What can I do?

I can stop myself from feeing powerless. I can stop my handwringing, and getting frustrated with myself and use this energy otherwise. I can make art to bring about change. No matter how small that change, starting from myself and vibrating out.

I can create stories of an imagined alternative, better, other world. I can create zines which challenge and refuse what has already been refused of us. I can blog about my own experiences in order to connect with others. I can paint/ print posters to raise awareness and change the messages of hate to love and hope. I can create community and create change together, one stitch, one word, one voice at a time. I can create poetry to create conversation. I can self-care so I can in turn community-care. I can donate time, money, resources to a cause I believe in and that is bringing about a better society. I can lean more into mutual aid to divest from racial capitalism.

I can keep showing up here, craving out a safe and brave space on the internet that is liberatory worldmaking, on my own terms.

Poetry is not a Luxury

| Sheree

As they become known and accepted to ourselves, our feelings, and the honest exploration of them, become sanctuaries and fortresses and spawning grounds for the most radical and daring of ideas, the house of difference so necessary to change and the conceptualization of any meaningful action. Right now, I could name at least ten ideas I would have once found intolerable or incomprehensible and frightening, except as they came after dreams and poems. This is not idle fantasy, but the true meaning of “it feels right to me.” We can train ourselves to respect our feelings, and to discipline (transpose) them into a language that matches those feelings so they can be shared. And where that language does not yet exist, it is our poetry which helps to fashion it. Poetry is not only dream or vision, it is the skeleton architecture of
our lives. It lays the foundations for a future if change, a bridge across our fears of what has never been before.

Audre Lorde, ‘Poetry is not a Luxury’, on Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches (Trumansburg, NY: The Crossing Press, 1984), 37.

My Wall of Fugitivity

| Sheree

I’ve got a chapter to write and it’s going nowhere fast.

I hate it when I think I have all the time in the world to complete a writing task and then I procrastinate.

I know I procrastinate because it’s important to me. Very important to me and I don’t want to get it wrong. So I do nothing instead.

Well not really nothing. This is my bedroom wall, where I’ve started to put up post-it notes to help me with the chapter on fugitivity.

This makes me feel as if I’m doing something. Seeing this everyday also, I hope, makes something go into my creative brain subconsciously. I’m hoping that living with it makes the wheels start turning and connections being made.

What I’m learning with fugitivity is that is’s not linear. Not a straight line from captivity to freedom, from unfreedom to freedom. It is argued that fugitivity performs freedom ‘as a constant struggle’ ( R. Slavitt cited in Davis, 2016).

This I hold close as I attempt ( struggle!) to write this chapter around fugitivity as this is not going to be a linear chapter from A to B to C etc. This chapter with its content and structure and form will be dancing with unfreedom and freedom, constantly struggling to convey meaning around fugitivity at the same time as remaining free from the academic frameworks and restricts and expectations.

In order to write about fugitivity I need to take on board fugitive methods and practices.

I’m spiralling and circling back and forth in a good way, in an honest way and hopefully the chapter will be the result.

My Last Journal of 2024

| Sheree

In the lead up to Christmas ( I started in October), we were getting a few deliveries and within each box there would be some brown paper. Padding, for safety and probably there to be discarded. But I loved the feel and sound of it. So I started to keep it and before long I got myself a nice little pile of brown paper.
I started by tearing the large sheets into A4ish sized single sheet of brown paper. Of course sometimes my tearing went awry. But no matter, it made that piece more unique and raw. Once I got a pile of sheets, I proceeded to apply acrylic paint to both sides. The colours my heart desired. I loved the mix and the new colours that were created through the process. I threw some white copy paper in the mix too, adding colour, smearing it with my trusty Costa card. Once dry, I folded each sheet and created a book with them all.

The cover and the middle section of this journal, are not my own artwork. This was gift wrap I received some goodies from across the pond a few years again from a friend. This friend, Jo, made the wrapping paper herself. She was a follower of Earth Sea Love and for a while there I had these pieces on my bedroom wall. After the decorating of my room, these piece never got back onto the wall but I wanted to use them still . And not let them go to waste, as I do cherish them.

With the book constructed, I just started writing in it for my morning pages. Not really sequentially either, but drawn to each page by the colours or the feel or the jagged edges. I loved working in this journal through December. I loved the feel of the pages and the sound as the pen scrawled across it, the rustle as I’d turned the pages. LUSH.
That’s what I do now, now that I’ve moved on to my new journal for 2025, I’ve been just sitting and turning the pages, and smiling at how this has made me feel.

I share this joy with you now, as I share my last journal of 2024.

Practice

| Sheree

What is one word that describes you?

“You know life is hard,” my mother once told me with resignation in her voice. She continued, “For years, I’ve been struggling. I’m just plain tired now.” I wasn’t sure if she was talking to me or herself , but once again I hardly listened. I was grown, I knew everything. I was a fool. Here one day, gone the next, I never got the chance to agree with my mother; that yes, life is hard. Too damn hard sometimes and there are people, put on this earth, who take it as a personal mission/ vendetta to make it even harder for some people. But hey I’m not here to complain.

This year, I made myself the promise to practice certain things, certain ways of being.

One, to quit the complaining as it only drains my energy.

Two, to stop saying to myself and others that time is flying, that time is going so fast, what’s that all about? (But come on, admit it, time is flying. We’re past mid March already!) Yes stop this stating that time is flying malarky as it’s energy sapping.

And three, to get my arse out of bed each morning, go to my creative corner and practice my visual journalling because this shifts/ boosts/ aligns my energy.

Some days I win, some days I lose but I know just like life, like everything really, it’s a practice. It’s about turning up each day for me and not having an agenda, or any idea what I’m going to create or know down which path my attention will flow. I just know that when I practice my visual journaling, intentionally showing up at my desk each morning, I feel better. Simple.

Yes there are all those insightful and wise deductions I could make about this practice and the effects of it on my creativity, life, work, relationship with self and others. But on the most simplest of levels, it makes me feel better. It sets me up to be present for the rest of my day.

Since November 2023, I’ve been practicing this little old practice of getting into my creative corner and creating/ being. Usually in altered books, or homemade junk journals or hand sewn books. Moving my hands to smear paint across a page, adding text and images, and stickers and sometimes even crafting found poems from cut-outs, makes me happy. I can say that now because I’ve had months of this practice under my belt. And I feel better because of it.

The one word that best describes me is ‘practice’ and I get to be me, daily, each morning with my visual journal practice which makes sure I’m myself from each moment to the next for the rest of the day. And for this I am grateful because my mother might not have found the secret and passed it on but I feel as if I’ve stumbled upon what makes this life less difficult, less hard, less soul destroying. Practice.

Keep checking back for the rest of the week as I’ll be sharing a spread each day from my visual journaling practice. And eventually all will be revealed in a new portfolio page around this practice. Thanks for reading. And see you again soon 🙂

Returning to the Highlands

| Sheree

The Glencoe region of Scotland has always held a special place in my heart. When the kids were little, we’d do driving tours up there, jumping from one Premier Inn to another really just to satisfy my own cravings for the Scottish landscape. The wide open spaces, the lochs and glens and mountains.

I created a self-imposed retreat in November when other plans fell through. I took my time to drive into the highlands knowing I was returning to my favourite hotel out there. Kinghouse Hotel, Glencoe.

The plan was simple to rest, walk and create. And I wasn’t disappointed by the scenery, the service, the weather or the creativity.

It was gift to just focus on me and my creativity. A luxury I was truly grateful for. I just want to do it again and again and again.

I fell in love with a mountain and glen up there. So I’ll have to return if we’re going courting!

Buachaille Etive Mòr

Preparing for the next chapter

| Sheree
New visual journal

Sometimes, I can feel my energy stagnating. Or being leeched away into activities, projects or circumstances that I want to be in but which if I allow it take me away from what is important to me.

I do great work and I enjoy facilitating/ creating/ coordinating it. Changing lives and bringing joy and opportunities to others, for others.

But sometimes, I have to strengthen my boundaries and batter down the hatches in order to make sure I can show up the best version of myself for myself and others.

The last couple of weeks have found me running low on energy, patience and creativity. I’ve been giving away a lot of myself, time and energy, and focus.

So the next chapter to the end of 2023, is focused on me taking back what’s mine. Taking back my time, my energy, my sparks and directing them in the directions that feed my soul. Which fuels my dreams and confidence in my voice.

And it starts with preparing my next visual journal. I’ve returned to a trusty old faithful. A pink pig sketchbook. And I’ve set up on my kitchen bench with paints and the gift card.

Every time I go into the kitchen, I create a spread. I smear drops of paint across the page with the disused credit card. I can feel my energy, my excitement and joy rising.

This simple act of moving colour across the page fills me with joy, wonder and ideas. My creativity has been lit up again and I’m looking forward to filling these pages.

Looking forward to dreaming on paper.

New visual journal

Saturday Mornings

| Sheree

When I was growing up, I loved Saturday mornings.

No school, even though I loved school. I had the whole weekend ahead of me with all that time to create.

It started off well, as dad would bring us breakfast in bed. It would be crackers and jam. I’ve written before about this special ritual and how I took it as a sign of love from my dad; him the strict Trinidadian who showed his roar more times that his smile.

After breakfast, we could get up and play in our bedroom, keeping the noise down as mum and dad had a lie in. I would create the magic wishing chair from Enid Blyton’s books. I would fly away to all these magical lands, where I’d meet welcoming characters and interesting animals who couldn’t wait to get to know me. With them I was the main attraction. They listened to my stories and cheered me on as I went on adventures into the forest or up a mountain. There was no place my imagination couldn’t take me.

And then I grew up. Dad died, my whole life changed and I put away my dolls and adventures as I attempted to traverse the rough terrain of middle school as the only black girl there. Only black, and fat girl there who had her period and was seen as an oddity at best!

More stories there to tell. But this morning, this Saturday morning, I wake with this same sense of expansive time ahead of me to create. To crave out my own adventures on my own terms. And this feeling brings me a whole heap of joy and excitement. As I can’t go wrong if I’m feeding my creativity; turning up to the page open.

I haven’t had crackers and jam this morning but the thought of it is making my mouth water. I’ve got the ingredients in ( cream crackers and cherry jam). I’d have to make them myself as I’ve got no one to make them for me to serve me in bed. But even that thought doesn’t dampen my spirits because I have the time and space to choose. I have the privilege and luxury to stretch out the decision around what I do or be next.

I’m obsessed with how creativity works. I’m obsessed with how my creativity works. This is what I wrote in my visual journal this morning. And it landed in my core. In my core centre. This is honesty. This makes me smile. This what I will continue to explore, for a lifetime.

Hello 2023 with Creation and Healing

| Sheree
The Earthcraft Oracle

Welcome to 2023. Wow. We got here quick with 2022 flying by. I wonder what 2023 has in store for us all?

I eased into the first day of 2023, after a lie-in, with breath work, meditation and intention setting. For the life I envision, I need to invite in the energy of calm and peace.

I know (re)starting my gratitude practice will support me in this endeavour. No matter how small, taking a moment to give thanks, a small act of presence, mindfulness, and care is a gift I could be giving to myself daily. So why do I resist or forget and allow this practice to disappear from my life?

Fear. And that belief that I’m not worth healing. That I don’t deserve happiness and peace. It’s time to switch up my thinking and ways of treating myself.

I pulled the womb card today from The Earthcraft Oracle. I’ve been pulling one card a day for months now, and today does not fail to chime with how I’m feeling or send me the message I’ve been listening for.

The womb is the centre of all creation. The womb holds all the potential. This card comes into my life today of all days to remind me how to awaken my sacral chakra. To lean into creation as here there is healing. Create and heal are the same thing.

To create, one must imagine something that has never been. To heal, one must be willing to embrace a new way of being.

The Earthcraft Oracle Guidebook

On the first day of the year 2023, I take on board this message and practice to stimulate my creative centre and bring forth inspiration and healing for myself, and for those who came before me and for those who come after me. Ashe.