Things Currently Living in the Studio

spoiler alert: we suspect It's not the "most together" version of me

Kendall's brain at work

I feel it is important to begin by clarifying that "The Studio" sounds much more impressive than it actually is.

The phrase conjures images of lofty ceilings, dramatic natural light, large canvases, meaningful conversations about texture, and somebody named Luca welding something in the corner.

In reality, my studio is actually what should be the living room of my house (sorry kids) and currently contains:

• seventy-three unfinished ideas

• one hundred and fourteen notebooks (had to write the number In full!)

• approximately forty-seven cups of hot water in various stages of abandonment

• a collection of sticks I have apparently decided are important

• several artworks staring at me accusingly

• and a bulb that has become strangely central to my understanding of life.

• 
  

This is not a joke.

Well. It is. But it is also not.

The truth is that studios are curious places. People tend to imagine they are where art gets made. I suspect they are actually where uncertainty lives.

A studio is where ideas arrive half-dressed and refuse to explain themselves.

It is where projects sit quietly in corners for months before suddenly demanding attention at three o'clock in the morning (only getting worse with perimenopause).

It is where you begin making one thing and somehow end up making something entirely different.

It is where you spend six weeks convinced you've lost the plot only to discover, much later, that the plot was simply taking the scenic route.

The studio Is also a random back room, all the bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and the entire front yard of my brain at any moment In time.

At the moment, several things are living in this studio.

There is a winter gathering In planning and excitement.

There is a living magazine unfolding.

There is a conversation about time that refuses to leave me (nor my friends) alone.

There are theatre ideas.

There are artworks.

There are questions about what it means to be human.

There are questions about what It means to be Kendall

There are questions about whether or not my friends can handle yet another question and dance around the mulberry bush about what It means to be Kendall

There are stories.

There are possibilities.

And there is also a certain amount of confusion. And fear. And stumble. And get up again. And ...

Not the alarming kind. (well, hopefully not)

The productive kind. (the stories we tell ourselves)

The kind that usually appears just before something starts growing.

real time image of my desk as I write (behind me)

Which brings me back to the bulb.

A few weeks ago I became unexpectedly obsessed with a row of yellow flowers beside my letterbox. Before they appeared, there was absolutely no evidence anything was happening. Just dirt. Cold weather. Silence.

Underground, however, a completely different story was unfolding.

I have a feeling that many things in life work like that.

Projects.

Art.

Faith.

People.

Healing.

all the things

all the stuff

Perhaps winter is not the absence of growth.

Perhaps winter is simply growth that has not introduced itself yet.

So welcome to The Studio.

A place for unfinished thoughts, half-made things, unexpected discoveries and occasional creative chaos.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go and investigate whether I genuinely need all these sticks.