The Year of Touch
Dispatch #22: The Paradox of the Type A Artist
Hi friend,
It’s finally happened.
(…Wait! Before we dive into this month’s missive I don’t want to forget this very important thing. As a special thank you to my readers, I want to give you $45 off this October session of In Surreal Life. All you have to do is share the code SUBSTACKQT in your application when you sign up (at any level). There’s just 2 days until registration closes. Go for it!)
Now where were we? Oh, right. It’s finally happened. My favorite 3-month-long holiday: autumn. I love summer, I love the sun & heat & beach days & the opportunity for constant soccer & I loved watching the Women’s World Cup Finals at a pub in my neighborhood at 6 in the morning & I loved the midnight crickets. But autumn? That romantic, heady, moody, sensuous girl? Also known as fall (how goth)? Also known as harvest season (how tarot & rot & morbid & lesbianic)? I’m so happy my season is here!
Sounded out aw-dum, could there a more confounding spelling? I mean, just look at the word: the au hypnotizes me like an endlessly lapping wave. There’s the designer-like-beauty of the strange double u around the tall tree of a t. And yum, the rare mn combo rounds out the end like a mouth closing around a cloud.
If I were going to rename autumn, I’d call it The Clarifying Season, or The Great Reddening. I might also call it The Hush-Hush-Hush Hour for the sound of feet walking through dried leaves & the way the wind seems to comb the mind, untangling our stagnant ways. I know that one shouldn’t wish for such unnatural things as this, but I feel safe enough to whisper it here: If I could live in a perpetual Autumn, I would. I think that might be heaven itself.
As my favorite season settles into place, I realize that I am 9 months into a personal experiment. Last December 31st (my other favorite holiday) I declared that the year ahead would be The Year of Touch. It was a simple proclamation, made mostly to myself. As midnight neared I journaled about this intention. After all, what would The Year of Touch really mean? I wrote:
• all about new experiences, personal growth, development & adventure
• open, curious mind, & sense of excitement
• no need for a green light or permission; the time is now!
• treat life like one big experiment (particularly helpful when it comes to ego, self-esteem & self-image)
• charge forward & learn the lessons you need to learn
• experience the physical world; the tangible; getting off screen; the physical body; relax, play & have fun
• remember THE EARTH: tactile, foundation, supportive, nurturing
• choose to share yourself; choose to join in
• (after pulling The Fool from my deck) The Fool is a reminder of the spontaneity inherent in every moment; anything goes, nothing is certain or regular (via Learn Tarot)
I wanted The Year of Touch to live outside of the realm of planning or achievement. I wanted it to be an organic response. I didn’t want to immediately let my anxiety win when something new was presented. The “something new” could be scary (like sharing a draft of my novel with a friend), or quite simple (like going out for a walk with someone I didn’t know too well). Either way, The Year of Touch was to be about thinking less & trying more.
9 months in, how has the Year of Touch been going? I’d like to ground you, visually, for a moment with this photograph of Surrealist sculptor, painter & poet Jean Arp.
Here he is, surrounded by his work; or put more simply, here he is surrounded by things he had the nerve to not only touch, but to shape. Arp said, "The forms come: pleasing or strange. They’re born of themselves. I only have to move my hands..."
I think of The Year of Touch as the willingness to move & be moved. The forms – the fruits, the truth, experience, whatever arises from engaging – will come, pleasing or strange. Isn’t that truly living? A collaboration with change, a refusal of stasis, no matter how comfortable. To allow oneself to be cast straight forth into the elements, be they gorgeous or scary, because then at least you get to feel the sea on your skin, you get to see the cliffs up close, you get to breathe in that data strictly for the living: the air?
Like Jean Arp, I’ve been sitting in the midst of my forms, pleasing or strange. These forms manifested of moments I was willing to play, to experiment, to touch, to be touched, to risk connection, to risk being seen, to allow myself to be fluid & take shape. These “touches” might seem simple to others, but to me they are accomplishments, born of resetting my compass to yes. Here are a few:
• I sent my rough novel draft to 2 writers I greatly admire • I said yes to walks with a new friend • I asked for help (over & over; in small ways & large; personally & for my business) • I opened up the option for readers to pay for my Substack • I swam amidst jellyfish • I made it a point to work on my anxiety via a workbook • today I celebrate 3 years of regular meditation practice, something I continue to say yes to • I initiated a poetry manuscript exchange with a friend I hadn’t seen in a long time • I signed up for MasterClass • I started swimming at a local community center • I splurged on a vintage 70s two piece suit that I saw in a store window & couldn’t stop thinking about • I let myself be treated to my first pedicure • I prioritized a vacation despite the inconvenience of taking time off • I set boundaries with family members • I advocated for higher payment in my freelance consulting practice • I tried out for a NY club soccer league & made it! •
Due to its epic name, The Year of Touch seems like a fancy, extensive project. But it’s not. After making my list of intentions for the year ahead that December evening, I put my notebook away. Until today, I hadn’t looked at it. I didn’t set a plan or SMART goals. I just knew that I wanted to step into the coming 12 months with these intentions in my heart, these considerations. I didn’t want to step into “anything goes, nothing is certain or regular” like a solider. Or into “treating life like one big experiment” by immediately creating strict boundaries on what that could look like. This was different for me, because I’m a very Type A person; an Enneagram 3 personality type with a tritype of 3-6-1 (any Enneagram nerds out there?).
For the layperson, forget the numbers & just know that my tritype’s nickname is The Taskmaster. I picture a very straight-laced superhero who can’t stop hanging frames, loading & unloading the dishwasher, reorganizing the silverware drawer, & so on. Sexy stuff!
It’s kind of funny to be an artist who is so into structure, tasks, & efficiency.
From what I’ve gathered over the years, students are drawn to work with me for how I can help them shake up limitations – to break rules, play, explore, have fun. But when I think of the actual time I spend with students & their work, I think of…tasks. LOL. I’m all about experimenting…within a certain structure. I’m all about breaking rules…once we’ve established those rules concretely & studied their purpose. Because our culture tends to paint artists as loosey-goosey, inspiration-led, whimsical creatures, it can appear counterintuitive to acknowledge the other side of making things: the righty-tighty, rigor-led, disciplined side. The paradoxical collision of craft & magic has always fascinated me. The balance seems integral not only to being a liberated writer, but to being healthy.
With regards to my own mental health, I’ve often reflected on how I integrate the practical with the magical. So many makers deny their practical side (a need for rest, community, regular meals, therapy) & instead dive headfirst into abyss: sleeplessness, mania, depression – even thinking it crucial to their creativity. As for me, learning to integrate the practical & the magical is a lesson I keep learning. For Odes to Lithium I wrote this poem about the pull to choose insanity over accepting I needed major help. It’s based on the true story of Dr. Kay Redfield Jamison choosing to buy a horse instead of “doing something about her moods.” The practical can be so much less alluring than the bombastic.
While I continue to use large territories of my left brain to draft my novel, to fulfill my daily to-do list, to do my taxes, & other such analytical tasks, The Year of Touch has proven to be a sweet respite. It’s not “a way of getting things done,” it’s not about productivity at all. It’s a way of orienting myself toward even the smallest yesses. Toward contact. Toward yes, I will let the world in. I will join in. I will risk touch.
Jean Arp also said, “To be full of joy when looking at an oeuvre is not a little thing.” The sensual world, beyond concepts, beyond screens, beckons us. When my anxiety rears its head & I find my first response is to cringe or recoil, I reconsider. What am I afraid of? What might letting go allow? What might I learn?
To close, how about two poems about autumn? One for the haters & one for the lovers.
& Here is a flicker of sea for you. May it not only reach you, but touch you.
With ample maple syrup,
Wow, you are so articulate. I strive to achieve similar beauty in the sequences of words that I use