A woman enters my booth. I don’t recognize her but, judging by her approach, it’s clear that she knows me. I employ my typical smirk of bewildered curiosity and say hello. As she cautiously approaches, I notice her red hair illuminated in the sunshine and her t-shirt: Rosey the Riveter that has been adapted to have red hair and a nurse tattoo. It all started out so typically but little did I know that by the end of this woman’s visit to my booth, my befuddlement would be replaced by quiet admiration and there wouldn’t be a dry eye between us.
I’ve missed talking to strangers.
Art festivals artists are a curious lot. We are part busker, part storyteller, often odd in a charming way and occasionally serve as street therapists. We all have our different creations and approaches to art and life, but in the end we’re just everyday people talking about the weather.
What a sight to behold. Back in action.
When Ashley and I quit our jobs and plunged into this life six years ago, one benefit that I failed to foresee is the fact that we get to meet A LOT of people from all over. I’ve found that the chance to connect with people young and old and hear about their unique perspectives is one of the most fulfilling experiences for my meandering soul. I am a collector of stories and I truly believe that we each have an interesting tale to tell. The art festival circuit gives me the chance to hear those stories and to be reminded of the inherent good in all of us. Put simply, I just love talking to strangers and meeting the people who take my paintings home.
When the pandemic hit last year and everything shut down, Ashley and I were struggling to figure out how we should spend the unexpected time at home. In the end, we found ways to stay productive: gardening and building a huge sculpture plus a series of small paintings titled, “Working Through the Pandemic”. The paintings were all in response to stories sent to me from folks detailing how their work had changed during the pandemic. I received a lot of responses and they allowed me to continue to connect with my patrons from afar while allowing them to be heard. One such contributor was Grace, an ICU RN based in Michigan.
Grace wrote to me in late March before the pandemic had done much in the US. She was a nervous nurse knowing that her job was about to get a lot harder. She wrote:
At the current moment, we are in the calm before the storm. We see it coming, we hear the stories out of Italy, New York City, and world wide and we know this silent killer is coming. We see the exhaustion of nurses and doctors everywhere and we feel the fear of what is to come. Outside the windows, we are surrounded by trees (my hospital is a small one in a relatively rural area) but now we have a white tent outside the emergency department doors. Everyone feels the tension of what the next few weeks and months look like, but so far all the tests we have sent out, have come back negative. We know it’s only a matter of time before our first one comes back positive. And a matter of time before we are working in unsafe working conditions and afraid of what we may take home to our families. I am an ICU nurse and I am proud of my profession and love caring for others, but I’m nervous about my exposure and what it will mean for others. In the news we are either touted as super heroes for working the front lines or discriminated again in public for what we might be spreading around in grocery stores. We are not heroes, we are doing what we are trained to do. But we are not villains either, we are taking all precautions that we can to protect ourselves, our families, and the public by washing our hands until they are raw and trying to follow the ever changing guidelines in our profession.
I remember reading Grace’s submission and just reeling with sympathy for all of the healthcare workers and the stress that they were about to bear. Her story moved me in its poignant portrait of the precarious state that her profession put her in. I felt for her. So I painted a portrait of a nurse and sent it to her, sharing her story with the online community.
The ICU RN | Gouache
And as this red-headed woman in my booth pulled a cardboard sleeve from her purse with nervous hands, it all came flooding back. This was Grace. This was the ICU nurse who had written to me over a year ago. Oh. My. God.
As I went in for a hug with reckless uncertainty, I was filled with a sense of familiarity; a sense of knowing this human more than our time together should produce. We talked for a long time about her experience as an ICU RN during the chaos and shared a few laughs and a few tears. We took a photo together with the painting that serves as the bridge between our worlds and we said goodbye.
Grace.
And that’s what art can do. It can close the gap between strangers, connecting us in unexpected and imperceptible ways. It’s a vessel carrying goods between islands. It’s a channel that allows us the privilege of talking to strangers and turning them into friends.
We thank you for your continued support of our adventure in art. If you have noticed that we’re not as present online as we have been in the past, that’s not by accident. We’ve been focusing more on in-person interactions (hooray!) and reconfiguring our approach to how we present ourselves online. You can read the full post about it here and check out our new Patreon page here.
We hope to see you in person soon! Until then, stay tuned and stay salty.