od·ys·sey        (ŏd'ĭ-sē)  

n.   pl. od·ys·seys

1. 1. An extended adventurous voyage or trip.
   

2. 2. An intellectual or spiritual quest: an odyssey of discovery.
   

3. 3. A long series of wanderings or adventures, esp. when filled with notable experiences, hardships, etc.
   

I have had a long and arduous history with depression.  It’s been with me for as long as I can remember, even as a small child.  I can remember being so, so sensitive as a kid, so quick to tears, so full of self-doubting, self-destructive thoughts.  But artmaking and reading always provided distraction and solace for me, invaluable therapies years (many years) before I even knew what was ‘wrong’ with me.  Time spent alone in my studio is like meditation for me, especially when I am in the midst of the serious (one might say tedious...) labor stage of one of the giant book pieces.  I get lost in what I’m doing and feel just calm.  I love my little family more than I could ever have imagined loving anyone, but even with them I don’t feel that kind of calm. 

However.

The most recently completely piece of mine, “Sing in me Muse, and through me tell the story.” (The Odyssey) provided that kind of solace only briefly.  Making progress on that piece was just an exercise in madness.  The curvilinear line was so wrought with tiny twists, turns, curves that I had to cut each line of text from the book into the most miniscule of pieces, sometimes only a couple of letters in length each.  Each page of the five hundred plus page book was taking me somewhere between an hour and an hour and a half to dissemble and tape down (do the math - yikes!) and it was just painful, excruciatingly painful. 

The unfinished piece travelled with me six years ago when I moved from Boston to the San Diego area, though I wondered if I would ever, ever manage to complete it.  My move to sunny San Diego was largely for mental health reasons, my thought being that sunshine, warm weather and beach time would all do wonders for my ailing brain.  In the long run, the move turned out to be the smartest move I ever made - I finally found a therapist (or two) who was right for me, a medication that worked for me, and (best of all) I met Xavier here and we got married less than a year after we met and have had two gorgeous little ones in the four years since that.  In the first six months I was here, though, wow, was my brain ever misbehaving.  WOW.  It was probably the worst my depression has ever been.  During this time, that giant Odyssey piece kept staring me in the face, an unfinished reminder of all the torturous hours I’d spent working on it.  It came this close - really, this close - to going into the dumpster.  I just couldn’t stand looking at it anymore and couldn’t imagine there would ever come a time when I would find it in me to finish it.

In better times since, glad I hadn’t tossed it but still unsure I would EVER finish it, despite promptings from Xavier, who thought it was really, really cool, I considered exhibiting it as-is, as an unfinished piece.  Maybe calling it ‘Odyssey Interrupted’, after not only the book it was created from but also a book that so spoke to me and to my situation, ‘Girl Interrupted’. 

Then I was contacted by Jean Clad.  She’s an accomplished independent curator who was putting together a proposal for a ‘big books’ art exhibition and was looking for artists whose work would fit into this theme she had in mind.  Doug Beube, another book artist (very cool work), who also works as the curator for the Allan Chasanoff Bookworks Collection, and who acquired my ‘Moby Dick’ piece back in 2002 for that collection, suggested me and my work to her.  She was going to be visiting another artist who lives nearby and wanted to do a studio visit.  Well of course I said yes.  And she came and checked out my work, including the unfinished (and somewhat beat-up) Odyssey piece, which ended up being one of the pieces she decided to include in the show when she invited me to participate.  My reaction - internally - was of course mixed.  Yay - I’m included in the show!  Yikes - I HAVE to finish that piece now!

Somehow, miraculously, though, my thinking just shifted.  Not only did I believe I could finish it, but I was going to entirely re-do nearly half of what I’d ALREADY finished, a part that had suffered some neglect and disrepair during the years in which I’d had this long love-hate-hate relationship with it.  And I did it.  I actually finished it!  With an enormous amount of help from Xavier, who built me a studio in the garage and kept the kids occupied for the couple hundred hours it took me to do it, and with a (finally) well-behaving brain, I finally managed to finish that damn thing.  And I feel very, very proud of it.  It is hanging up now at the Long Beach Museum of Art, a small part in a fabulous group show, and it looks - if I say so myself - terrific. 

WHEW!