This year has been strange and adapting to all the uncertainty was exhausting. I was lucky to be able to work from home but it had become extremely demanding. I was at my place all the time but between the emails, overtime, following the news, and trying to keep up with the daily chores, I hardly had any real time for myself.
I wasn’t making as much art either. I love photography but I was mostly limited to things in my immediate environment. I love writing but I didn’t feel like I had the energy to delve inside myself. I wanted to draw more but I wasn’t feeling particularly inspired. So I returned to an old love: coloring.
It was peaceful, fun, and helped me feel like a kid again. Face down at my desk covered in pencil shavings and blasting music. That was how I spent a significant amount of my childhood.
Some years ago I lost about half of my music from a computer glitch. Slowly I’d add songs back as they would flash in my memory. Over the last few months I rediscovered a lot of songs I hadn’t heard in years. Ones I remember singing along with my friends in high school. In a conversation with my mother I remarked about how they don’t have an oldies station on the radio anymore. That inspired me to find a bunch of songs I loved from the 50’s and 60’s.
Senses flooded with familiar music and playing with color. It made me feel reconnected.
