Persistence

First there was the drought. Then came record-breaking temperatures and the worst bushfires Australia has ever endured. Next came the much-needed and prayed for rain … but it rained and rained and rained, and then rained some more, and there were floods and landslides and trees came down.

To say that this has been one of the worst summers I have lived through is an understatement. For weeks I was trapped indoors due to intense heat and/or smoke, and constantly on alert; then trapped indoors again because of the excessive rain. Then I ended the season with a cold.

Because of all the disturbance I barely entered my studio over the last few months, and my routine (such as it was) was lost. Now that autumn has officially begun, and I am almost recovered from my cold, I feel that some sense of normality is slowly beginning to return. Though with the knowledge that so much has changed that life here will not be the same, it is bittersweet. I dread the thought of next summer.

To top things off, I am now in one of those horrible and uncomfortable phases of the creative process when NOTHING seems to go right and I doubt my abilities completely. I have no idea how to paint, and don’t know how I ever did! And I seem to be undoing more stitches than I am sewing. I can only hope that in persisting, I will make it through to the other side of this obstructive period and find flow and fluency again, just as the destructive summer is gentling into autumn.

It is, perhaps, a good time to take stock of what has gone (mostly) right so far this year: I have made two Strata Tops designed by Sew Liberated, which I am really pleased with, and a couple more sewing projects are in progress, including one partially self-designed. I’ve completed a small knitting project, and am eager to do more. I am working on a new painting, the design of which I am happy with, if I can only work out how to paint it. And I just came across this lovely review of Heroines: Volume 2, which mentions my story. This has cheered me.

So, all in all, maybe things are not so bad. Still, bring on autumn, I say!