There is vehemence in the aphonic.

Sometimes the words that matter, carry gravity or lackthereof depending on how you look at it, elude me. I allow myself to get mired in weaving words and language when all I need to do is utilize my powers of brevity.

I've recently found that while my linguistic skills are still somewhat muddled, I am able to get down to the roots, my roots, through painting. I am no aficionado, prodigy, or expert, and others who might ever have a chance to see my painterly side, will probably think it's total sh*t, but it's cathartic to me and I find beauty in my lack of skill.

My lack of language. My lack of training. My lack of expertise. Understanding and embracing the awkward of something new again. I haven't taken to canvas in years. I never felt my skills were good enough. I never felt good enough.

The messiness, the abstraction, layers slathered on, then peeled away. Imprints that are there if you look closely and not too critically. I've never considered myself an artist or artistic for that matter, but over the course of this extended roadtrip, I've found that maybe I can release some of what I want to say and scream onto a canvas. The canvas doesn't judge. It just is.

Painting my heart has been a release. A damn good one at that.

road trip is going well. haven't had a camera other than my phone, so i don't have many pictures, but i do have some to post.

it was soSOso good to see some of my favorite people in knoxville. then maggie and i headed to alabama to visit my oldest sister, barbara. we had such a great time there, neither one of us wanted to leave. i discovered that maggie truly is a waterbaby. not just bathtime. pooltime, too. we would have gone to the beaches there, but with the oil spill, that was a big fat no since the beaches were shut down. not so awesome. now we're in fayetteville, nc, visiting one of my best people, meka. while i may have not known her for very long before she left cleveland, we had a connection and what i would define as being an authentic friendship. our visit to her has only solidified my thoughts on our friendship and how blessed i am to have her in my life. heck, this whole trip thus far has clearly shown me how blessed i am to have such awesome people in my life who truly care about and respect me as much as i do them. they are all in my heart. and they are all in my family. tomorrow (well, later today) we are headed up to raleigh to visit dayna for the day before she jets off on her FREE TRIP to the cayman's until sunday. then we will get more dayna time on monday and tuesday before i meet john in virginia to do a maggie tradeoff so he can have some 1x1 time with our precious babe. i'll miss her so much, but i will admit i am looking forward to a little bit of downtime. she's a very busy baby, and a little break won't hurt me or her. this journey she and i have taken has been such a godsend. i have no other words.

i'll be checking in again soon. :)

Maggie and I are headed out on Turtle Road Trip 2010 in 4 days. Booyah! Is that how you spell that word? Boo Yah.

I'm excited. Nervous, and maybe a little sad to be going for so long. But excited nevertheless.

I've started compiling playlists for the road, and will hopefully have them all set by Wednesday. I'll hopefully have everything all packed up by Wednesday as well. I think the latter is a little bit of wishful thinking on my part, though.

Yeah, I'm excited.