The Best of Everything (1967)/ How Sweet It Isn't (1968)

It's cold and wet outside and I don't have to care. Next Saturday is all that matters. The weather report is tentatively good, but I have already decided it won't be possible to bring all the Jell-O to the Market, so I will just bring a couple of pieces and take all the rest of the installation to the gallery for its three-hour tour.

I am about as far into the Jell-O obsession as it is possible to go...and after next Saturday it will all be over for another year. I like spending three months on a big project. The twinges of concern about losing perspective and flirting with grand delusion are just part of the dark side of big efforts. I understand that hardly anyone will see the positive aspects of this project, and most will just see the overdone, overly detailed style in which I seem to work.

On the other hand, I finished and printed a perfectly lovely violets design so I have something new for the Market that allowed me to explore my interest in botanical illustration and also make some money (potentially). It didn't seem obsessive at all and I'm rather pleased with it. I do have to paint in the yellow centers by hand because the three-color waterbase designs are just hard to do and the tiny parts fill up and dry in the screen...with the fine detail of the green screen I just thought the yellow would never work. I don't mind the painting-in. I also printed dye onto some silk squares for hangings, a product that may not sell at all and is technically difficult. The many steps can lead to doing it over a few times. On both these and the eight Saturday Market flags I printed, the dye wasn't strong enough and washed out. I handpainted over it, so now I am really good at that Saturday Market lettering and the details of that basket. They're kind of rough in quality but next time I do it I will have better results. I'm not too sure that hangings are a good product anyway. They're just the progression toward lighter and more valuable items that I'm exploring for my old lady days at the Market.

Still no good idea for the Jell-O t-shirt and not much time to come up with one. There have been off years in the past, so if I have to give away t-shirts nobody really wants very much, it isn't that different from giving away ones they do want. The truth is that I give away at least half of the shirts every year no matter what. It's just part of how I do this thing, the Jell-O Art Show.

Even though as a Radar Angel I have had minimal involvement in the real work, I take a lot of ownership of it, having exhibited at all of the shows throughout the 22-year history, and having made the shirts for many of those years. I guess it is my way of feeling important in a world that has consistently intimidated me and left me feeling inadequate (I'm talking about the art world, but I'm inadequate to many worlds.) Like many people I walk a line of wanting attention for my efforts and squirming in any kind of spotlight. Mostly I just want to do the work. I have thoroughly enjoyed this winter, despite the tough emotional issues I've struggled with. Every time I touched the grief, I worked on the Jell-O. It's no wonder I didn't want to stop. Transformation is a powerful task, as is grieving. Powerful, and ordinary. We all have to navigate it.

Technically, I discovered so many things. Just the other day while reading a recipe for tacky green bean salad I read "soften gelatin in cold water." I had been trying to dissolve gelatin in hot water for all of these years, coming up with lumps and doing an excessive amount of stirring and remelting to get it clear. It is so much easier in cold water! I feel really stupid, but it's a great lesson on questioning one's process right back to the beginning once in awhile.

I've found it fascinating to tend to the pieces while they get to the right stage of pliability to make the shapes I want. The stuff is sticky and not sticky, will bend to stay or go back to where it was, and the process is a gentle encouragement with minimal control. Yesterday I took some time to make foam.

There is a short window of a minute or two when the liquid gelatin will make bubbles, and then it gets too cold. A big spoon works a bit better than a whisk, and there's a lot of technique involved in whipping up the bubbles. I spoon them off the surface and place them in a dish, where they harden up. It's tedious but I needed the seafoam to finish off the beachy part. If I have time I will make some flotsam and jetsam and shells.

It's gratifying to explore the techniques. I'm in love with the medium, so the results aren't really what matters. I suppose it would be good to fall in love with a medium that I can actually make money doing, but there's always someone doing those better. With the dried gelatin, I'm kind of out there by myself. I feel like an explorer, in a constant state of curiosity and delight. That state is probably what got me through my childhood and troubled youth, and I still want to dwell there.

The neighbor kids were out with their light sabers battling each other, with the usual hurt feelings and "it's not fair" disputes. I finally suggested that they be on the same team and do some exploring of the wild lands which our tamed adjoining yards might look to be from a child's perspective. They tried it for awhile, and I was glad I have finally learned how to redirect in a neutral way, now that my kid is long gone from playing in my yard. I remember admiring that so much in my Mom on a long hike when my son was bored and complaining, and I was taking it all personally and not coming up with anything but frustration. My Mom just easily engaged him in some alternate train of thought. I hope I get to be a Grandma like that.

Parenting's pretty much over for me, though I get to watch from a distance while my son discovers things to point out, for the delight of his friends and for my education in all things Now. I'm having to redirect myself. The parenting role is so huge, and I immersed in it with great dedication, so I'm having some trouble feeling valuable in my new role. It's a mystery how people navigate through life. We figure out a few things and then are left in the dust to fondle what used to feel important, or we keep stumbling along trying to keep up.

I may have a strange slanty perspective, but it just makes me feel more like an artist and want to tip over a bit farther. I learn so much from seeing other people do it, whether or not they find balance and live lives that seem acceptable to others. My guru said this week to start working on judgmentalism by learning how to judge myself less. Start with me. I guess I can work on it.

I'll put it all out there. I'll be embarrassed and earnest and look like the dithery fool old woman I am. I don't know why I think I can hide anything anyway. Like Jell-O, we are all transparent, no matter how seductive our brightly colored exteriors. And there is no judge! There is no prize, nothing to win, no contest.

Just the doing. No reason to agonize for weeks over a cheap white t-shirt I'm going to give away to lukewarm response. Out of the hundreds of t-shirt designs I have come up with, this will just be one, like all the others. On the world scale, not even a significant part of the inventory at goodwill. Possibly a place in three or four bottom-drawer t-shirt collections.

And yet: the agony, the drive for greatness, the attachment to originality. All to be a tiny tiny minnow in an infinitesimal puddle.

Somehow It's Always Right (1971). Make Some Fun (1979). It's Alive (1995).

You Can't Be a Kid Without It. (1988)

Six more days, then it jells.