Painting

My words paint....they are my art.  My creative bent.  My way of coping, of connecting, of giving.  They are what I have to offer. Not with the purpose to know more or to behave as if I hold the answers.  No, but like artists, sculptors, painters, musicians, I feel and see my words.  I use them to share my view of the world, of circumstances, of hopes, of pain.  Often when I write, I picture a piece of art in my mind.  Not someone else's, one never created.  I have not the ability to make art.  When I try, it turns out all wrong.  But, somewhere, sometimes, maybe only occasionally, my words become the art themselves.  And that art speaks.....to me.  It comforts me when I am down and makes laugh at the ridiculousness of circumstances.  It is a gift.  Not, "I am a gift."  No, my words are a gift.....but not so much for others.  They are a gift to me.  A way to unravel the complexities of the world.  The pains that accompany relationships.  They help to catalog and order my thoughts.  They bring reason and questions to my experiences.  Without words, I feel......barren.  And not just in body, but in mind and soul and spirit. When I write, it feels like God joins me where I am.  And I wonder how it can feel like an act of worship when it's just words.  But, it is the pouring out of who He made me to be back to Him......and in that moment, it is like feeling His hand, His breath, His being physically near.  And, in that place, it is as if anything is possible.
There has come an "opportunity" to write for a book contest.  Could I?  Should I?  The chances of winning with the thousands of entrants is very slim.  And, do I have anything to say that would be fresh or speak to someone in a way that moves them?
I know that this thing with words is a gift.  But, I'm not sure that it is necessarily a gift that others will understand.  Just as most artists are not understood nor collected until they are gone.....because one person's words, thoughts, feeble attempts at explaining life with art or words really has no more bearing than anothers.
Last weekend when I was yet again explaining to my husband how he just can't seem to support me, I used writing as an example.  And he said that what I was saying wasn't true because he remembers sitting on the couch before we were married and reading my poetry about children and saying that it was pretty good.And that he remembers me telling him that I had sent it out and that nobody would publish it.  Nearly twenty two years ago he said something positive....that's what he has in way of being supportive.  And I couldn't even begin to explain how hurtful that was.  I shared from the very beginning who I was, what I hoped.  Before I was married there were people encouraging me to be published.  I sent out manuscripts.  It didn't happen, but I still didn't feel discouraged.  But now?  Now, without sending out anything, I am discouraged because he doesn't give me credit.  Doesn't believe in me.  Doesn't see me.  He sees him.  How the world affects him.  And cares about the things that make him comfortable or uncomfortable.....and until a situation does that, he has no interest. 
If I write the book for the contest, I'm not afraid of losing.  Not at all.  I am afraid that this budding rebirth of knowing myself again as an artist will be destroyed....not by my failure, but by his view of my failing.  That "see, I told you so, " attitude.  I've seen it so many times before.  Yesterday.  No matter what it is about, he has never hoped and believed the best for me.  He likes to set it up to show how he is better, he is more, he does the right thing.......and how HE is a real writer.  Hard to be married to an editor who doesn't believe you have anything special to share.
And, maybe I don't.  But still, my words are a gift.  If only to me.  A way through.  A path to show the way on the journey of life.  Sometimes inspired.  Sometimes inspiring.  Often simple.  But, my art.  And one day, maybe I will find my David.  My Mona Lisa.  My Sistine Chapel.  Maybe.  Or, maybe not.  But if I quit.  If I don't write prolifically, I will never know. 
grace to you.