Working My Way Into a Funk

Today was my first day off in a long time. I was so hungry for my art. Admittedly, she looks a little too thoughtful, like she's very weary in her soul. And she is.

Well, it's her own fault.

I get very involved in my work on the farm. I get up really early and get out in the fields and in whatever machine is serviced first, and then I am driven like the machine by some demon child within to work until I am completely exhausted. Sweet Farmer tries to get me to come in but I want to do one more thing.. one more row...and then, maybe one more. It's like I'm trying to break some kind of record. I won't quit for lunch or socialize with the other farmers like my Sweet Farmer who is not wound as tight as I, thank goodness. I just go further into this dark cave of intensity until splatttt- I can't go any further. I swear I'm not going to do it the next day and I do.

I'm too keyed up to go to sleep very well or very long. I hate to take sleeping pills because of the after-effects.

It's only later that I realize how very isolating and lonely, and hard on my psyche it is to work like that, not to mention the tole it takes on my body.

And then, Sweet Farmer says I'm too far ahead of everybody and I have to wait a few days for things to balance out.

And then, he takes me out to eat for a nice lunch. We visit and talk to other friends. I create some new art. I look at your art on the blogs, and soon beauty is again restored to my soul and I re-set and begin to feel refreshed.

I have this cute little ditty in my office to remind me when I'm paying a price for my passionate nature, when that bulldog tenacity isn't serving me well:

If your nose is down to the grindstone rough,

And you hold it down there long enough,

Soon you will say there is no such thing

As brooks that babble and birds that sing.

Three things will all your world compose:

Just you,

the grindstone,

and your darned old nose. - unknown

Now if I can just remember this tomorrow.