Advanced Art

Write about a time when you didn’t take action but wish you had. What would you do differently?

I wish I had gone to grad school. Of course it was art. No one would have thought an advanced degree in art would have served any purpose whatsoever, at least not in my family, (my patents and then husband). They may have been right, but I would have loved it! I loved all my art classes, the more advanced the better. I later took a few fiber arts classes after I had kids, but only because I was friends with the professors, I had no plan to keep going with school, I was busy with three little kids and a baby. I was also in an archaic marriage that didn’t support women doing anything outside of domestic chores and certainly not anything outside the home. My husband rarely ‘babysat’ for our own kids! It wasn’t his thing.

It was really a wonder that I did the things I did. Looking back, I marvel at everything I pulled off with four kids in tow. I stopped doing too much with painting, and one time, clay and a learning-to-walk baby, taught me that I needed a less messy medium. Fiber was the answer. I quickly taught myself to spin and weave and knit. I made inlay felt ‘paintings’. Dyes were my favorite. I had fun, my kids learned all those things as well. All my kids can knit and sew. So can my grand kids even though I’ve long since gone back to paint.

Oh to have taken some graduate school level painting classes! How different would my life be today if I had taken my art more seriously? In a different mindset, I might have gone all the way and gotten a doctorate. In art. I would love telling that story. Who knew I would be pushing at practicality anyway for my whole life.