Creative Flow

Much like Aunt Flow, she's a fickle, often painful b*tch. Why I am extra grateful for those who shine their light when it's dark out.

I don’t know about you, but I am wiped out. Like most of us, it could be any number of things : the Santa Fe allergies that have hit my nasal cavities with the force of a hurricane (it’s the junipers everyone is saying), living in a new place and dealing with/embracing the newness of it all, the news (enough said), or probably most serious, the uncertainty of resources for trans people as I go into the early stages of HRT.

This list, given what is happening right now with just the people I know, is pretty cute. So many of my friends and colleagues are performing super-human acts of emotional and physical strength. Working 12 hours, 7 days a week to meet a creative deadline. Forced to go to work as a nurse while passing kidney stones - yes this is real. Scraping together a new life after the LA fires. It’s all wild and feels unprecedented, but I guess it’s not.

At any given point in history there have been reasons to be traumatized. Reasons to be down, depressed, and immobile because of how awful things are. And at the same time, there are always artists who have made work that inspire us, entertain us, distract us, keep us going.

This is sounding a bit like the time Nicole Kidman talked to us about movies in a sparkly pinstriped suit, but it’s true.

I feel like the odds against the creators and artists are always great. And the stakes for making art are always high. They’re never not high. I’m not saying all creations or creators will have an important effect on humanity. But the act of making is in a way preserving humanity, keeping us elevated one bad poem, and one crappy painting at a time. To shut off the creative instinct is to shut off what it is to be human. Then again, being human is kind of rough so I get why you wouldn’t want that. So much imperfection.

I have to remind myself this as I get up in the morning filled with ideas of things I want to write and paintings I want to make, but swamped under the weight of the other things - the shoulds. No matter when or where we’re making art there are all these obstacles in the way of creativity. But also, there’s nothing to do but create and expand because that’s how the universe functions. Right? That sounds true but it can be hard to execute.

At one point I read something about changing the statement from “I paint when I’m happy” to “I’m happy when I paint.”

This paradox of creativity even in times of rest or turmoil is something I’m thinking about right now as we go into, gulp, the fourth month of 2025. My heart breaks when I hear about people who are getting the worst of it- trans kids, migrants, lonely souls who are overwhelmed- and that they are giving up. So when I think about our creative practices, it’s hopefully not the only thing keeping us going, but I do think it’s easy to underestimate how impactful it is to do something creative and share it. Creativity can lead to connection, new ways of problem-solving, new ways of understanding the world.

It can also lift someone up who isn’t able to see things clearly in the moment. If you are in one of those places where you don’t have it in you to write something down, bake a cake, draw a doodle on a napkin, creativity by proxy can be enough.

I am personally so grateful for comedians right now, who, by all accounts suffer through their crushing depressions, humiliations from bombing, and poverty to make us all laugh for a minute.

I’m a forever fan of the uneven genius of Saturday Night Live writers and performers who, year after year, offer hot takes on political issues, mostly-failed skits about everyday life. Occasionally there are moments that will stick with you forever, like this diner sketch called Brenda The Waitress from the 90s. Its absurdist film noir take on a country diner features Jan Hooks and Alec Baldwin as would-be lovers. Every time I watch it I’m impressed by the writing and the acting, especially the fast dialogue between the characters. They clearly memorized their lines, which is rarely the case anymore.

To just be grateful for the creative output of others can be tough when you’re blocked. I am currently feeling a bit out of sorts not having a studio of my own right now, but at the same time feel lucky to be painting 8 hours a day, three days a week for someone else (shero Amy Ellingson) despite that fact.

When I do have time to make work, I have been making small watercolors on paper. I can make them while traveling and I love that the water and pigment flow and change on their own, with minimal effort from me, for once. Whenever I do a little painting, I always feel better. They might not be resolved or the most impressive things I have ever made, but doing them is a show of resilience in the face of the most change I’ve ever been through, in pretty much every aspect of my life. And that’s saying a lot.

This is a watercolor I did while visiting a spot in Abiquiu, a cluster of gray sandstone cathedrals that became famous through the paintings of Georgia O’Keefe.

Making art of any kind is a commitment to life, to saying yes, to growing and flowing even when that feels at odds with your insides. I hope you are all finding ways to keep it going and not being too hard on yourselves.

By popular demand, a photo of my kittens Dior and DiDi on the night of the full moon a few weeks ago.