always something

Living with a chronic illness has taught me: there is always something happening in my body. Sometimes in the background, slowly changing my functioning, sometimes in the foreground, acute and distressing. Sometimes it is even something good, finding joy in sudden possibilities or the slow progress of rehabilitation.

Lately I have been struggling with my digestive system, it is painful to eat, it is painful to digest my food. Not always, but most days it will happen. My whole torso can get into a painful cramp and it becomes hard to breathe. I’m in the medical testing phase and will be there until there is more clarity. I’m more tired than normal and have trouble sleeping, which is not helping.

Lately, too, the past few months, I have been in a creative frenzy, flow state. I have been making a lot of clay labyrinth portraits for a lot of people, all over the world. With the labyrinths, I write a text to accompany the labyrinth, telling people what I was thinking, feeling about them, while making the loops and spirals, and painting the colors.

I love this work, this practice. I have the feeling that everything I have learned, and everything I am, comes together in this creative making.

The most beautiful thing is, that even if the person I make the labyrinth for, is not someone I know, what I make and write feels true to them. They feel seen and known.

I am so grateful to be alive.