When I heard about the Bead Journal Project June 2007- May 2008 I was just thinking about making some beaded jewelry. I thought it would be fun to create some hair barrettes for myself.
This is my first barrette that I made. I called it Scheherazade. Catherine and I had gone to see the 1001 Arabian Nights at a local ballet company.
I was kinda hoping to tell my story through barrettes. The barrette would be a symbol of what I was thinking.
I really didn't think I could express my thoughts as well as some of the authors that had developed my thinking.
I think that all art is a distillation of life. We are only down here for a short period of time. While we are here there are things that are happening and we are trying to make sense of it.
I have gotten kinda freaked out in thinking about the Leaves of Change Barrette that I mentioned in my post yesterday. At the time, September 2007, I feared a stock market crash. This was a when the housing bubble was just starting to get holes in it. There were still tv programs about how to flip your house. How housing was a good "investment". All the Sneetches with Houses felt better than the Sneetches without one in their portfolio. Investing for retirement, 401K's, mutual funds were all part of the vocabulary of the last 10 years.
It was before the CEO of different financial institutions gave big bonuses to themselves and others at the expense of the tax payer. It was before Berny Madoff. And it was before QE.
I just saw an economic slide coming.
I have always valued book list that different friends have given me through the years.
I wanted to high-lighting the classics that spoke to me and our current times by making a barrette for the Bead Journal Project.
In Bambi there is another clue to what the leaves become when they fall.
Bambi is talking to him mother about going to the meadow. He wants to go in the middle of the day.
"His mother was patient. "Only in the early morning or late evening," she said, "or at night."
"And never in the daytime, never?"
His mother hesitated. "Well," she said at last, "sometimes a few of us do go there in the daytime...But those are special occasions...I can't just explain it to you, you are too young yet... Some of us do go there....But we are exposed to the greatest of danger."
"What kind of danger?" asked Bambi all attention.
But his mother did not want to go on with the conversation.
"We're in danger, and that's enough for you, my son. You can't understand such things yet."
Bambi thought that he could understand everything except why his mother did not want to tell him the truth. But he kept silent.
"That's what life means for us," his mother went on, "though we all love the daylight, especially when we're young we have to lie quiet all day long. We can only roam around from evening till morning. Do you understand?"
"Yes," said Bambi.
"So, my son, we'll have to stay where we are. We're safe here. Now lie down again and go to sleep."
But Bambi didn't want to lie down. "Why are we safe here?" he asked.
"Because all the bushes shield us," his mother answered, "and the twigs snap on the shurbs and the dry twigs crackle and give us warning. And last year's dead leaves lie on the ground and rustle to warn us, and the jays and magpies keep watch so we can tell from a distance if is coming.
"What are last year's leaves?" Bambi asked.
"Come and sit beside me," said his mother, "and I will tell you." Bambi sat down contentedly, nestling close to his mother. And she told him how the trees are not always green, how the sunshine and pleasant warmth disappear. Then it grows cold, the frost turns the leaves yellow, brown and red, and they fall slowly so that the trees and bushes stretch their bare branches to the sky and look perfectly naked. But the dry leaves lie on the ground, and when a foot stirs them they rustle. Then someone is coming. O, how kind last year's dead leaves are! They do their duty so well and are so alert and watchful. Even in mid-summer there are a lot of them hidden beneath the undergrowth. And they give warning in advance of every danger.
Bambi pressed close against his mother. It was so cozy to sit there and listen while his mother talked.
When she grew silent he began to think. He thought it was very kind of he good old leaves to keep watch, though they were all dead and frozen and had suffered so much. He wondered just what that danger could be that his mother was always talking about. But to much thought tired him. Round about him it was all still. Only the air sizzling in the heat was audible. Then he fell asleep.
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