A friend, and woman whom I went to high school with and who used to live across the street from us in Superior Montana is missing. Kelly Jo Merseal Dube – Woodward has been missing since Tuesday morning. She sent me an amazing birthday greeting on Facebook late Monday night, reminding me of 30 years back when I used to make paper movies and project them on a bed sheet on the wall, and it reminded me of how creative my life has always been. I sent her a message back saying how sometimes I wish we could return to those simple ways life used to be. I have seen Kelly over the years at the annual Mineral County Fair or some such community events, but mostly we have reconnected through Facebook the last couple of years. Several years back I worked with Kelly’s daughter Jesica, who was interested in photography and came to work with me as an apprentice for a short time. This morning I heard from Jesica and there is still no word about her mother.
Kelly’s car was found at a camp ground out in the woods abandoned just south of Superior. But I guess what strikes me most is the power of Facebook. There have been many people posting to Kelly’s Facebook page since she turned up missing. An out pouring of love, connection, fear, concern, and pleading for her return. What strikes me most is how many people we actually get to know in our lives and the complexity of how our lives touch so many others. As far as I know Kelly has never really left Superior, nor ventured beyond our small hometown, yet she has touched so many people. I know she is very active in the community and seems to always be involved in something. The Facebook responses to her absence goes on for pages and pages, all filled with so much emotions. Wow what a network of people we all get to know and what a powerful tool Facebook has become to bind us. As I continue to follow what’s going on and am becoming emotionally involved I still feel a strong connection to Kelly and hope with all my heart this morning that Kelly is found safe and in good health and that her family’s minds can rest at ease.
On my birthday I had over 150 people send me a birthday greeting. I was awestruck by so many people sending me messages throughout the day. Though I have not physically met many of the people on my Facebook, I feel I have developed a strong connection to so many. It’s funny how we can now connect to people all over the world and develop friendships that can be stronger than with others I have physically met. It is remarkable how many people I will know as the degrees of separation seems to narrow. There are so many people I now want to desperately meet. What a strange and wondrous world we now live in and how our lives become so intermingled in this remarkable era. Years ago I thought I lost all these connections to things and people from the past, but now it is a wonder to be so emotionally invested.
My ongoing question has been: “Are we born to be artists or is it something we learn?” If anyone has any thoughts they would like to share, please comment. I know I was not really born as an artist and growing up in a family of engineers, there wasn’t much creativity. Then, growing up on a cattle ranch in western Montana there wasn’t much exposure to art. I know as a kid I liked to color with crayons and was very good at staying within the lines. I think somehow I have always been drawn to color. I was always prone to approach things from a different perspective and tended to do things outside the norm. In retrospect many of those approaches would be considered gay. So do gay and being an artist go hand in hand? Am I gay because of my creative difference? Perhaps a touch of artistic freedom tends to accentuate both personality traits. I certainly know a lot of wonderful artists who are straight. Growing up I didn’t know what gay was and I didn’t know what art was and yet somehow have been affected by both. So does this mean I am genetically predisposed, contributing to both traits? I do not recall hearing about any other gay or an artist for that matter in my family lineage. But of course growing up in the west, both of those ideas may have been taboo unless you were Charlie Russell of course. Yet, both traits tended to be outside of the norm of my functioning world. I guess what it comes down to is that, I have always lived a creative life. I am beginning to think creation isn’t only about art, but an attitude by which we choose to live. It completely surrounds us. For instance to garden, you are affecting the way plants grow, look and take shape on the Earth. Though some people may only plant in rows there is beauty in that creation. The way we dress, makes a statement about who we are, it’s still a creative choice. The car we drive adds to that image. Home furnishings, we can’t live without, more essential choices, more expressions of creativity. So in a sense we are all imbued with an artistic license or at least the possibility to make choices, whether we use it or not is another matter. Personally I think there is something creative in everyone, though I think most choose to ignore it. Growing up there always seemed to be a fear and phobia about being an artist. The myths being; that we would be poor, or socially unacceptable, possibly different, perhaps with a fear of being labeled gay. I certainly know that it was frowned upon in my family and growing up it seemed such a struggle. Things have certainly changed, because now I have become all those things and I think my family adores me because of my difference. It has been a long journey to understand this. Perhaps they always saw it and it was more of an internal struggle to accept it within myself. I guess I have always felt the creative impulse. For the most part I have become what I am by learning and studying the process of others, by being inspired by things beyond myself, but mostly by being fearless to reach for things that I didn’t understand.
This week I must switch my focus from bare bums to bare roots as I have got to spend the next several days hunkering down into some of my garden projects. In the summers, I have a large old Victorian house next door that used to belong to my friend Gilbert. Gilbert loved gardens and he taught me a love for the process of the garden. When I was a student back in college days I rented the carriage house on Gilbert’s property. Whenever I had free time I would go out and help Gilbert with his gardens. In fact he and I did most of the work to establish the gardens as they currently are today. So when I would come home from one of my jaunts, as he would call them (work in the theater for me), I would stay with Gilbert and help him with the gardens. It seemed over the years Gilbert got further away from what he loved most as I got closer to perfecting my green thumb.
Unfortunately they only come to visit the house once a week about every other month, so the garden essentially has become mine. I keep trying to get away from it, but it is still one of my passions. Once I get it all planted the commitment is less to maintain and upkeep, but this week I need to pull it all together for another season. I keep wanting to let go because I am becoming far too busy with other things, but it is like a child that you cannot just abandon. So it’s time to pull on the old Carharts, get my hands dirty and dig in the earth.
Back to the regular grind of life. It feels like my life has been on a high for the past 4 days. I figured today I would give some details since everyone keeps asking, starting last Friday night when my brother Mark and sister Pam came down from Kalispell on Friday night to spend the weekend with me. I have felt a bit estranged from my family for so long, but this weekend we all really connected and I feel the bond with my brother stronger than I ever have. Saturday was a flurry of getting the house ready for an incredible party. My nephew Brenden showed up a little after 10 and we began to clean through everything on the property. There were still remnants of the wind storm from the previous week, though I had been trying to clean up most of it throughout the week. I had this old set piece, the Bountiful house, for a stage production of The Trip to Bountiful, that I had laid the foundation for, but had never quite assembled but have been trying to put together for 8 years now. It took us about 6 people to assemble it on a flat stage in a theater, now I was trying to assemble it on the bank of a creek in the back yard. Between the three of us we managed to get all the pieces of heavy steel frame together and standing. It kind of becomes one of the focal points of my back yard. I saved it because I thought it would make an interesting backdrop for outdoor images. So we cleaned and weeded everything as Pam completely cleaned the inside of the studio. Early afternoon a wave of helpers came by and we set up tables and chairs and torches for the party, others came and began to decorate. I somehow managed to crawl into bed and took a snooze with kitty, Bob. Mark, Pam and I rubbed pork loins with spicy rubs and prepped salmon to be grilled.
The party was magical, the back yard was transformed into a beautiful garden terrace. You see I have not quite had a chance to finish the back yard yet, and am actually on my 2 year of a 10 year plan, so it very rough still, but beginning to take shape and when I am done will become one of the most extraordinary places to hang out. So many people came bringing all kinds of food, and drinks. Glenn had somehow orchestrated the entire process from his potato fields in North Dakota. It was amazing I saw people I have not seen in a long time. It was like suddenly all my different worlds were colliding. My family, old friends, new friends, and models I have been working with. I felt truly humbled by their presences. It lasted into the night, the air filled with the rapture of laughter. When everyone had left Mark, Pam, the kitties and I were alone, with very little mess because Pam had already cleaned most of it.
Sunday morning I was awakened at 730 am, a call from Sky Dive Montana, that the skies were a go and I could jump according to plan. I needed to be the Ronan Airport by 10 for an 11 jump which was an hour away. Mark, Pam and I had coffee and talked as my nerves began to unravel as to what I had possibly gotten myself into. I was seriously having doubts at this time. The drive up seemed interminable, my heart racing faster the nearer I approached, my eyes always searching to the sky in wonder.
A special thanks to Mark and Pam for coming to make this event such a success and so memorable. Thanks for sharing such a huge part of my life with me. I have reestablished a bond I thought lost or missing for years. To me this was actually the greatest part of the whole experience. I love you guys so much.
I woke up this morning and opened my lap top to see it filled with so many birthday greetings. I have taken the entire day off just to have some fun, which will hopefully be simpler than yesterday. Today I just want to focus on things I am passionate about, mostly photography. I have planned two, possibly three photos sessions today. To me this is the perfect day to create interesting images. I have a lot going on in my head that I now need to explore. And it’s not like it’s actually work today, because it’s going to be a day of hanging with people I really want to spend time with and explore. I can’t think of any better way than to celebrate the day of my creation by doing something creative. The refrigerator is filled with food to last me a week, an array of amazing tasting vittles so I really don’t have to go out today. The light is so beautiful in the studio this morning. Everything feels renewed after the rain last night and the foliage radiantly healthy and vibrant, which creates an extraordinary glow off their leaves filling the studio space. It somehow feels the strain and tension in my back, neck and shoulders from the past couple of weeks has been lifted; perhaps now that the party and all is behind me. The entire north facing ceiling of my bedroom is filled with big open skylights. Yesterday I awoke with trepidation looking up as I awoke. This morning I saw glory in the wafting clouds. Something has definitely changed. I will look to the heavens differently now, with less fear. I could barely sleep the night before, because I kept waking and hoping the weather would derail my plan, my head filled with such anxious dreams of falling, but last night I slept so incredibly well. Have I changed so much from such an experience? Perhaps it is the cumulative progression of the past couple of days that mark my passage. Today I don’t feel older, but actually more youthful than before. I have always marveled at how I have retained a youthful quality about me, for many years feeling like Dorian Gray. My hair has not begun to gray, nor recede, nor thin; my body is flexible and in relatively good shape, and my stamina seems robust. Yes the creases are beginning to creep into my face, but I have earned them. I have begun to take on those distinguished looking characteristics I so admired in my grandfather during my youth. My body, my mind and my spirit are always in motion, I think it’s what keeps me in shape. It is time for a new self portrait this week, so I can really take a look at what I have become.
