I promise.

I feel this weight of anxiety on me right now. And not one overwhelming anxiety, just a thousand tiny ones. A bill coming up in three days which I haven't paid yet, for whatever ridiculous reason. Mailing out paintings. A bee in my bonnet over something that I should have let go of by now. Deadlines for writing. Painting calaveras, and skeletons. Health issues. Unsent emails that may or may not cause conflict. My weight. Anticipating my daughter's year anniversary in THREE months. I have so many appointments coming up, I feel overwhelmed and excited about them. I like taking care of business, and yet I get all twitchy and anxiety-ridden when I have stuff on my calendar. September was a virtual deluge of social engagements. Taking us out of our fortress of solitude and into the world of functioning adults always makes me pouty and weird. Why do I ever make plans? No, really, I dread them until I go and have a fine time, but the weeks of build-up chap me. The truth is, no matter how much I claim to be anti-social and introverted, if you ask me for lunch, I am usually busy. I always have stuff on my calendar. How does that happen when I am allergic to the whole making plans thing?

Lately, though I've been immersed in painting and writing. It feels good to be exhausted from creativity. To feel you have earned two hours of mindless television reality shows is a wonderful feeling. AND YET, anxiety sometimes makes me feel like I have this intuitive portent of impending doom. My thinking falls squarely in the apocalyptic these days. I go from fine-fine-fine to THE SKY IS FALLING. It doesn't help my husband is in a futuristic sci-fi phase of his reading.

"Can we get a crossbow? And a gigantic cistern for water?" He paused, stared off into space. "Oh, and a generator. We totally need a generator."
"What the hell are you reading?"
"It isn't about that, Angie. I just think we need to be prepared. Just in case. Why, does it bother you if we become a survivalist family?"
"We live in New Jersey, dude. Our neighbors will steal our stuff, and eat us within the first month. We need a compound if we are actually going to survive."
"Speak for yourself, wife, I will have a crossbow."

Still, the other day, while anxiety-surfing and being unproductive during naptime,I saw this new addition to my studio on Etsy. It was an impulse buy, much like the psychic reading I had a few months ago, but what can I say? It spoke to me. Please ignore the chaos of my studio space.



The print is entitled, I promise. It came with a postcard of a forest that simply read:
you are lovely.

Why, thank you. I feel better already.


*If anyone is interested in this poster, I bought it on Etsy here.