Cutting.
It was not a thing when I was growing up.
If it was a thing, I was unaware.
It is a thing now.
Mostly girls.
Cutting themselves where, usually, it is not easy to see.
My favorite art show was Declaring Space: Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman, Lucio Fontana, Yves Klein Sep 30, 2007 – Jan 06, 2008 at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth in 2008.
By 2007 I was aware of cutting, but unaware of Lucio Fontana’s slash paintings.
The impact of seeing the paintings was visceral. The emotion. The shock. The direct correlation in my brain between cutting and the paintings. I remember thinking, “If cutters could see this art, hear his story they would understand what they were doing to themselves and why.” I remember that if they could deal with issues visually they could stop damaging themselves.
I remember BLURTING all this out during a docent led tour.
The docent was not feeling it.
We moved on.
I was deeply moved.
Space. Opening up space. Cutting.
Why do people cut themselves? I kinda, sorta pass out when the nurse takes blood.
Cutting was not an option for me,
but it was for my niece
and for a friend so I did some research.
Why? There is not an easy answer.
For any single cutter there is not even a single answer.
What I am sharing comes from my minimal research and my personal experience.
Before I go there, do you see what I have done?
Are you angry with me yet? You probably should be.
For any single cutter. I have reduced a large swath of humanity to a single word: cutter.
Black.
White.
YOU PEOPLE!
Do you see how easy it is to ignore the humanity of the other?
Full, complete, complex human beings who I defined by a single action. Cutter.
As I am writing that there are no easy answers I found it very easy to use a label. A single label.
I am sorry.
I will not go back and re-write. (Okay, I did a little re-writing!) Let us allow it to be a lesson.
A lesson I will most probably need to revisit again today (and tomorrow and for years go come.)
Why do human beings cut themselves?
- The pain is a distraction from the surrounding circumstances. Cutting brings the focus, for a moment, completely into the present.
- When there is no control, perceived or in actuality, in one’s life, this is an area of control over one’s own body.
- Power/Secrecy. There is power in having a secret.
- Cutting releases of endorphins.
- ….
So what does this have to do with “Confessions of a Cutter?”
I have never cut myself (on purpose) but I have hurt myself
and my children.
I have cut myself off from things and people I love.
I have done so as a twisted form of punishment/incentive.
I still do it.
I did it yesterday.
We home schooled for 22 years.
This is the first year, Fall 2016,
everyone is either in school or has graduated.
I am focusing on making art and developing a healthy art business.
(It is way more fun to make art than to make art and run a small business, but I am catching on! If you knows someone who needs some wonderful art for their home or office or business PLEASE connect us and I will be forever grateful.)
Too often while home schooling, Instead of doing what we loved FIRST we focused on the drudgery.
Instead of enjoying learning and each other and then getting to the less fun stuff, we did the drudgery at the expense of what we loved.
It was wrong. Too often we never made it to the fun as we ALL hated the drudgery.
I justified it by saying the fun, our passions, would be the reward, the carrot before the horse.
Rewards. Carrots. They might work for some.
It did not work for us.
We ended up tired and worn out.
Without energy for each other or for fun.
I am not saying we spent 22 years mired in hell.
For the most part we enjoyed each other and home schooling.
What I AM saying is that many opportunities were lost.
Too much time was spent cutting ourselves off from the better.
Eat dessert first!
Yeah, veggies, too. And brush your teeth after.
But eat dessert first.
The business side of things are overwhelming right now.
I am finding myself cutting myself off from what I love
UNTIL I have completed xyz.
I say what I love will be my reward
when really I am just punishing myself.
Cutting myself off from what I love.
Cutting myself off from what I need.
There are a couple hundred paintings in my living room that need to be photographed.
What have I been telling myself?
Gwen, you can ride when you finish those paintings.
Gwen, you can read a book when you finish photographing those paintings.
Gwen, you can spend time with your friends AFTER you finish those paintings.
Guess how long those paintings have been in my living room?
I am not saying it has been a year,
but I COULD say that.
I miss riding. I miss reading. I miss my friends.
Last night I walked OUT of my living room and went to this season’s first Tuesday Lecture at the Modern. It was good. I did doze off a couple times. Not because it was not fascinating, I have four pages of notes to prove that it was, but I dozed off because I am wrung out.
Cutting myself off from what gives me energy and inspiration is self-defeating.
I did not self-identify as a cutter until 7:23 this morning.
I was walking Wesley and watching a truly magnificent sky unfold.
As I was watching the sun and the clouds and the blue interact I saw the Lucio Fontana painting from eight years ago.
The memories leapt to the forefront of my consciousness and I knew that the revelation from so long ago was not for cutters, it was for me.
I am a cutter.
Today I begin a new journey.
Today may we all choose to spend a moment with who and what we love.
Peace.
Joy.
Monarch butterflies.