Lessening Chaos

As I said Monday, it's a difficult time for me psychiatrically.  And I'm grateful for the support I've been getting - thank you.  You know who you are.

I do try to push back.  I make a concerted effort to fight against this, even to the point of ignoring when it's time to cry uncle and say "I can't do this alone."  I said to my doctor today that I am very stubborn when it comes to that, and her response was simply that I know what works best and she trusts me to make the right decision when I need to.  

Yes, I'm stubborn.  I don't want this to defeat me, even though I have to concede that I might be in a little more trouble than usual.

But I digress.

Art is of course one way to fight the demons.  If I can make myself create something, at least I can feel as if I've accomplished something.

But one needs space in which to work.  My collage space, specifically speaking.   Clutter ruled the space.  Not that I didn't know what was where - we artists always tend to know what we have and where we put it, right?

But I knew that visitors to my flat were a bit, um, bemused by the clutter.  And even I had to admit that it was getting in my way.  I really didn't have much room to actually WORK.

So, in an effort to try to keep myself busy I decided yesterday that I needed to do something to make things work better.

This is the before

In my defense I have to say that I live in a 2 1/2 room apartment so there's not a lot of space to begin with.  This apartment wasn't made for a crazy mixed media artist with tons of supplies.  

But it still needed some semblance of order.

Tuesday, then, was spent trying to create order.  Visible order.  It took me about 4 hours or so to actually get to the point where I was satisfied that things made sense.

and

Bins on the shelves are labeled, what existed in several containers is now combined, and things are in the right place - for now.  We all know, of course, that as we're working things tend to get messed up again.  But the space feels less cramped, and even lighter.  As you can see I am close to windows (and the air conditioner) so there's light.  My usual desk lamp now lives on the painting table (which also needs organizing), so I need to get another for this space to work at night.

Now that this is organized (for now), maybe I will actually be able to create something here.

later,
lin