Envisioning the future

I'm in the middle of a week off from work right now and have been taking the time to think about what's next for me. I thought it'd be good to devote some time to sit down, look at what I've been doing the last couple years and where I want to be headed in the next 12 months.

I enjoy creating art and trying out new ideas in my paintings, but it's incredibly difficult to pay the bills from that. And I have zero interest in being a graphic designer (which apparently, according to some people, is the only "real job" you can get if you're interested in art). I really love teaching, but it hasn't been a consistent gig for me. And I'd start to feel claustrophobic after awhile, being in a classroom every day. I like a little more variety. Thoughts like this have been running through my head with more frequency, and I was just feeling frustrated trying to figure out what I want to do with my life. 

It's easy in the midst of day-to-day life and work to just go from task to task and lose sight of my passions. I need to remind myself to keep my goals big and not condense my plans to a little bubble. I hadn't realized how small and unfocused my world had gotten lately until I started reading through this book a few days ago:

And I got some For Dummies titles too

It's been really eye opening so far, just writing down my values and what I like and don't like doing. I'm one of those people who enjoys making lists and filling my head with all kinds of informational tidbits. What I'm not so good at is actually doing something with all of that material. There's not much point to learning something new and insightful if it doesn't change anything about your life. I can't just keep writing down and talking about what I hope to do or want to pursue. I've actually got to put my plans into action. There is so much wasted potential in this world, and I don't want to be one of those people who could have done something great but was too lazy or scared to try.

But the hard part has been visualizing what I want to do with my passions and interests. It's all well and good to say, "I want to do something I enjoy," but without a goal to pursue, there's no direction or drive behind it. I also like having money, so I want a job that I can actually support myself with. But there's so many different avenues I could go down and particular passions I could pursue. However, I don't want to isolate just one facet of myself; I'd really like to involve all my strengths and interests.

So the exercise I did this morning was especially insightful. In Chapter 5, you're asked to write out your day five years from now. And it starts with simple things, seemingly mundane moments: What time do you wake up? What's your bedroom look like? What do you see when you look out the window? What do you hear?
At first, you think, "What does this have to do with a job, finding the career I want to pursue?" But as you go through the questions, you realize that you can't just compartmentalize your life into separate segments--"Work" over here, "Home" over there, one not affecting the other.

I ended up typing a whole page and haven't even answered every question so far. And as I was mulling over the answers, I was really struck with how small and safe I've been living my life lately.

I say I believe in a big God, and yet how does my life reflect that? I say I want my life to be like Jesus'....but do I really?  I settle for surfing the Internet and browsing Facebook, filling hours with nothing of importance, making excuses: "I'm too tired...I'll get to that tomorrow....Next week will be better to finish that...I'm not in the mood right now...Oh, that's so much work, I don't know if I can do that..." and blah blah blah.

Do I really, truly believe that God is Who He says He is? If I'm honest with myself, I know what Jesus said his followers' lives should look like...but I'm not living it. Life is not easy, I know that, but am I pushing through the obstacles or just using those roadblocks as an excuse to not try?

Jesus said, "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly." It's tempting to only look at the second sentence, and get indignant that life isn't going my way. But the first part of that verse reminds us that living a full life requires effort and work, that there will be many obstacles to overcome to pursue what we love. Not that there might be hardships, there will be; it's a fact.

My dreams--the ideas that I've only shared with a few because they seem so audacious, so amazing, so big--will only ever be just that if I don't step out in faith, being bold, remembering that God has called me to something bigger than what I'm currently living. It's scary though. I like being comfortable. I like ease, I don't like having to lean on anyone else, trusting they will come through for me. I like to be my own savior. But if I keep on that path, nothing will ever happen. And that's not the life I want.

Sketching 1

Here's a peek into my sketchbook. I just drew this the other day. I'm trying out some new ideas, just figuring out how I might incorporate micro-organisms into my work. Also, I'm trying to be more loose when I draw and letting things be more organic and less uptight.

Fresh inspiration

This is a magnified view of a bacterium. Sort of looks like a doily, doesn't it? I've always been interested in microbiology actually--I like looking at diagrams of cells and other micro organisms because they're so visually appealing to me.

My sister, Hannah, recently shared this pink image with me, and suggested I might want to look at other magnified images like it to inspire me. I Googled a bunch of different diseases and found some interesting images. Horrible illnesses, bad bacteria and viruses can be quite beautiful when seen under a microscope. They're obviously some sort of coherent structure with their own symmetry, but organic and natural enough that it's not too geometric. It's natural not man-made. I'm intrigued by that balance between structure and randomness.

My work in the past has been slightly influenced by this background interest in microbiology but only subtly. I've been thinking about genetics and inheritance off and on for awhile, but I didn't feel like I could convey those ideas in the way I wanted to. As I've expanded my repertoire of art making materials and played around in the studio recently, I feel like I'm getting closer to the heart of what I want to convey with my art.

I think this is going to be a more overt inspiration from now on. More to come....

Works in progress

My sister, Leah, snapped this shot today of a corner of my art making space in the basement of our house. There are several different ideas I'm playing around with that are encapsulated in this picture. 

I'll leave it up to you to guess what artistic rabbit trails I'm going down at the moment. :)

I flip something around to face the wall when I'm not sure what to do next on it.

History Detective pt. 3

What an adventure today from one old journal! I just got in touch with Diana Wolfe, Dave Warden's mother. Apparently, they've been trying to track down more information about the history of the Warden family. Diana just e-mailed me a few minutes ago, sending me a few pictures as well.

So now I have a lovely face to go with the name:

Blanche Warden

This is probably from right around the same time as when Blanche was writing in her journal. She actually mentions having pictures taken during June, so perhaps that's what this photo is from.

I finished reading her journal this afternoon. During the summer of 1910, Blanche and her family went to the lake. She writes about how hot it was, going to the yacht club for parties and dances, and hanging out with friends by the beach. Since there was still plenty of pages left to fill, my theory is that she must have lost her journal somewhere while her family was vacationing.

How cool is this whole thing?! This is what I love about the Internet: I can find an old journal and within a few hours discover who the author was and get in contact with descendants of the family! I'm hoping to get Blanche's journal back to them as soon as possible.

History Detective pt. 2

In my last post, I told you about my discovery at work of an old diary owned by Blanche Warden who lived on 21st and Humboldt Ave S in 1910. I shared what I assumed about her based on my knowledge of Minneapolis history and what she wrote about herself in her journal. I've only read up to page 40 so far, though Blanche wrote about 95 pages. In this post you'll learn about what my brother, Andrew, uncovered after doing some detective work online.

First, he Googled Blanche's name but got far too many results from all over (also, we couldn't read that her name had an E at the end of it at first). He narrowed the search to her name and Minneapolis, noticing a hit for descendants of Alexander Warden on Ancestry.com. Someone was looking for information about his family, listing different names and birth dates. One name was Blanche L. Warden born March 20, 1892 in Minnesota. Could this be our girl?

If you read further down, another user posted some interesting information, some of which I will re-share here:

David Charles Warden, lived at 2112 Humboldt Ave. S. in Minneapolis in the home that he built. He and Ida had 6 children. I believe he was a land developer and built many mansions that are in the Kenwood area, Lake of the Ilse areas of S. Mpls. He and Ida lived there until their death in 1937, Ida in 1940. His son Lee Meredith Warden and his wife Olga Sand Warden moved into the family home, Lee was a grain broker and Olga was a famous interior designer, famous for doing the architectural interiors of many private clubs in the Minnitonka area and her clients were the Daytons and the Pillsburys who also lived in the area. 

Well, the address is right, so that would make David Blanche's father. She mentions at one point she and friend dressing up in Lee's clothes and playing around. And Marion is a name that I've noticed often. In the list on Ancestry.com, Marion's birthday is January 31st. Blanche notes on that date "Marion's birthday. 16 yrs old." I then flipped to March 20 in the journal, and what does it say? "My birthday. 18 yrs old seems mighty old I can tell you." So we found our girl! And I was spot-on about their family being quite rich and well-connected. Blanche's sister-in-law designed home interiors for the Pillsbury and Dayton families, who are still movers and shakers in the Twin Cities to this day.

As I was reading further on Ancestry.com, it looks like there's only one person left in the family line:

Lee was the only child of David Charles and Ida Belle to have children. They had two children Mary Lee and David. When Olga died in 1968 their son, David Sand Warden, an accomplished artist moved into the family home. David Sand has only one son, the last of this line of Wardens, David Wolfe Warden, who lives in Austin,TX.

The house on Humboldt is still there (I looked it up on Google maps this morning), but it looks like the family has almost died out. It's odd that only one of Blanche's siblings ever had kids.
As I'm doing more sleuthing, it looks like David Warden's mother is looking for information about their family. I'm going to try to get in touch with her to see if she'd like to have Blanche's journal.

Read Part 3 to find out what happened next!

History Detective pt. 1

I have worked at Half Price Books (the one in Crystal MN) for almost four years now, and in that time have bought a vast number of books from the public. The majority of the time it's just run of the mill stuff--mystery and romance paperbacks, the latest Jodi Picoult, Twilight, etc. It's what Half Price calls the "bread and butter" of our stock: we pretty much always have copies on the shelf because there's just a lot of those types of books out there.

There's also a large amount of stuff that's just in very poor shape that gets recycled right away: severe water damage, mold (ick! that's when we don gloves), questionable substances (is that blood?), bodily fluids of various kinds (oh, hello, cat pee), books with no covers, kids' titles that have bite marks and are ripped almost in two, etc. You get the idea.

Every now and then though I get to uncover a real treasure. My hands once held a book worth over $2,000! (it was on Marc Chagall with a series of original etchings by him included; there were only about 1,000 copies ever printed) Another time, I noticed this small book about magic in a stack I was going through and on a whim just decided to look it up on the Internet. It was selling for $300 online! I think we ended up selling it for $150 in my store. Books like these don't pass through my hands very often, but when they do it's always a treat.

Last week, I found this in a box I was going through:

Seems pretty innocuous at first glance, right? You can't really see it in this picture, but most of the spine covering has fallen off. It's a little beat up and worn but still intact. I flipped it open and saw this written inside the cover:

It's a little hard to read in the picture, but it says:
Blanche Warden
2112 Humboldt Ave
Minneapolis MN

Well, my interest was piqued since that's a local address. I immediately knew that this was also a very old book and that the person who owned it was probably quite well off. How did I deduce all that from only an address? The age I guessed by a few things: One, the writing style tipped me off. And two, it was before the avenues in Minneapolis were given North and South designations, so that tells me the city was still small. If it was Humboldt Ave N, I know that part of Minneapolis wasn't developed until the housing boom following World War II. So I knew that it had to be what is now Humboldt Ave S, which is a well-to-do residential area to this day. It's less than two miles from downtown, and that part of southwest Minneapolis is near the Lake of the Isles and Lake Calhoun with many beautiful historic homes lining the streets. If you lived there during the 1900s, you had money.

That whole thought process took about 5 seconds as I flipped to the pages written on. There's a section at the front meant to be for contact and address information, which sadly is blank. The first entry is dated December 28 with no year.

Turning a few pages though, revealed an entry marked January 1, 1910. So I was right about the age! Skimming a few entries, I quickly realized I was spot on about this girl's socio-economic status as well. I caught a sentence where she wrote, "Henry called on me in his machine." So she had a friend who was rich enough to own an automobile in 1910 (the Model T had only just made its debut two years prior). I read snatches of this or that person calling for her while she was out, so this girl's family had their own phone. And mostly what I saw in my brief perusal was how many parties she went to and how late she got up in the morning.

I didn't think the person who is in charge of the Nostalgia section would put this out for sale, since it's just an old diary. But it was local, so I thought it might be of some interest. I put a note on it saying if it wasn't going to be priced up, I wanted it just to read through the entries. A few days later, I got it and have slowly been making my way through Blanche Warden's notes on her social life.

I'm only on page 40 (very glad that it was printed with page numbers) but what a glimpse I'm getting into Minneapolis of 1910. This is what I've learned so far:

I guessed Blanche was in her late teens, because she mentions going to school, doing some studying, writing a book report about David Copperfield, starting a new term at the end of January and skipping 6th period to go to the Orpheum. And does she go to the Orpheum a lot! I'm only into mid-February and I think I've read at least seven mentions of Blanche and her friends going to that theatre. It was apparently quite the social event, because she writes about feeling like the whole town was there for one event. Another time she writes "we sat in an upper box." Yup, definitely rich.
Blanche was quite the party girl, because most of what she writes is the names of the people who came over to visit or whose houses she went to call at or who was at so-and-so's party and how late she stayed out. I know she had well-off friends, because in one entry from January, she notes that they were served pineapple and cookies at someone's home.
Also, one last name caught my eye--the Calhouns were over for a visit one day. I'm guessing this is probably the family that the lake is named after.
Blanche also notes offhandedly in early January that, "We got a new cook today," and in another entry that, "We only have one girl now," which I'm assuming was a servant.
Also, when she writes of riding in a "car," it's not an automobile but a street car. I bet you didn't know that Minneapolis and St. Paul had a very extensive street car system back in the day (and then they tore it all up, because buses were the wave of the future, and now we're paying tons of money to put lightrail in, but I digress).

Streetcar map from 1913

From this map, I realized that Blanche had a street car line run right by her house, which she could take straight downtown, which she mentions doing on a number of occasions.
Usually though she would get a ride with her friends, either in a carriage or the aforementioned "machine;" a couple times she's given a ride home in a "limousine," which I'm guessing is a bit different than what we think of today.
Blanche writes often of feeling tired and getting up late in the morning (I wonder why when she stayed up so late partying), though in mid-February she comes down with typhoid fever! She doesn't write from February 24 through March 16 because she was so sick, mentioning she had a temperature of 103 at one point!
That's on page 39, where I stopped reading last night.

I've written so far of what I deduced from my knowledge of Minneapolis history, and what I've learned from reading what Blanche wrote, but in the next post I'll share with you what my younger brother, Andrew, uncovered after doing a little sleuthing online.