studio index: Baby land

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Baby land

Two weeks ago today this little guy arrived--my baby boy James Timothy Thomas. We're slowly figuring each other out. Even now he sleeps sprawled across a pillow on my lap as I type out on the porch.

There has been no work in the studio obviously--as I'm just taking life moment by moment, or trying to at least. But nothing changed my studio practice more than the birth of my first child over six years ago, so I wonder how this little person will make his presence known in my creative life.

3 comments:

Sharon said...: There is nothing quite like a new baby to provide clarity. They are a lens that enables us to focus so intently for awhile. Once we get back to the wide angle, everything seems a little different and a little new.
Such a beautiful boy.; August 16, 2011 at 3:30 PM
Ellen Campbell said...: Good to see this sweet lttile face and your words about him...; August 16, 2011 at 6:34 PM
Sara Schneckloth said...: Barbara, he is beautiful!!! Enjoy every moment, my dear, you are both stunning individuals!!; August 19, 2011 at 9:42 AM

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Notes

Within an ephemeral present, we return through memory to things, places, and events in the past in order to find purpose and direction in our lives. Meaningful time is elliptical time.
Vigen Guroian

I have concluded that the whole misfortune of men comes from a single thing, and that is their inability to remain at rest in a room.

Blaise Pascal

May your imagination know the grace of perfect danger.

John O'Donohue

The amount of life I can put through my eyes is the amount I can see.

Ivan Albright

When I painted a chair recently, I noticed that I put the paint on indifferently, smoothly but without particular attention. The results were satisfactory but not in any sense beautiful. Does the attention in itself with which paint is applied in art actually change the effect of the paint? Does the kind of consciousness with which we act determine the quality of our actions? It would follow, if this were true that the higher the degree of consciousness, the higher the quality of art. I think it likely. Training in art is, then, a demand that students increase the consciousness with which they employ techniques that are, in themselves, ordinary.

Anne Truitt, Daybook

It was suggested to me that I would want to preface this reading tonight with a short statement about my philosophy of writing. Of course I don't want to do anything of the kind. My approach to literary problems is very much like the one Dr. Johnson's blind housekeeper used when she poured tea for him. She put her finger inside the cup.

Flannery O'Connor