Counting the Omer with Visual Journaling - Day 8

Today is the 8th day, making one week and one day of the Omer.  In 2011 I wrote:  "So glad we started with Chesed and not Gevurah, or this would feel unbearable - "   It felt like an abrupt shift to move from the week where Chesed, or Lovingkindness, was the overall container of all the other qualities. In my visual system it was moving from a large circle of yellow gold to a large circle of red.  The Gevurah qualities of strength and discipline felt so stern compared to Lovingkindness.

It helped that by the ninth day I started using a less intense red for the big circle, and as the week progressed I began to appreciate the value of Gevurah energy, as you will see.  Even though today's quality is of Chesed within Gevurah, or Love within Strength, it still was difficult for me in 2011.  This year I know how much I need Gevurah's strength.

Counting the Omer with Visual Jouirnaling - Day 7

Today is the seventh day, making one week of the Omer.  The tenth Sefirot, Malkhut (Malchut), or Kingdom, is also Shekhinah (Shechinah), the Queen, or the indwelling presence of God.  I chose white for this Sefirot, surrounded by a black circle:  no color and all colors, an integration of male and female.  As I wrote at the bottom of the right page:  "Beyond Understanding."

I still find it to be beyond understanding.  There is a reason I collaged one of my favorite phrases on the left page: "Intergalactic Jewish Space-Jockeys Have Hijacked Your Mind. "

Counting the Omer with Visual Journaling - Day 6

Bonding within Love - sounds good!  Yesod (the ninth of the ten Sefirot) is the quality within Chesed today.  Since Yesod is associated with sexuality, it is nice when it is the quality in the week of Chesed, or Lovingkindness.  I had fun using collaged images on the left page, and writing "sexiness for connection and attachment," and  "Love your body,"  back in 2011.

This year, I took my collograph print called Betrayal over to DaVinci Art Alliance, an artist's co-op where I am a member, for a show in collaboration with Philadelphia Shakespeare Theatre featuring art inspired by their production of Othello.  Do we need a more vivid picture of what happens to our relationships when they are torn by jealousy, mistrust, revenge, and betrayal?  It is the shadow side of Bonding within Love!

Something on the collograph plate actually tore through the paper in this print, leaving an area in the paper that looks like punched out teeth.  It was unintentional at the time, but I like the effect.

The emotions connected with betrayal and feelings of jealousy and mistrust are part of the human condition - something all of us have experienced in our lives at one time or another.  It is good to have a whole day to feel the energy of Bonding within Love, Yesod withing Chesed, as a reminder that those qualities are something to be nurtured with awareness.

Counting the Omer with Visual Journaling - Day 5

Today's quality is Humility within Lovingkindness, Presence within Love:  Hod within Chesed.  On the left page of my journal I glued an Omer counting aid from a 1986 Jewish calendar, one of many I have saved because of their wonderful photographs and images.  I had colored in only eleven of the forty-nine barley sheaves.  In 2011 I wrote "Whoops.  In 1986 I lost count.  It happens."  "Intention counts."  "Forgiveness of oneself."

This year I am aware that tomorrow at dawn Christians around the world will celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  This evening we watched 5 BROKEN CAMERAS, an Academy Award nominee for Best Documentary Feature.  http://www.kinolorber.com/5brokencameras/.  "Shot by Palestinian farmer Emad Burnat, who bought his first camera in 2005 to record the birth of his youngest son, Gibreel, the film was co-directed by Burnat and Guy Davidi, an Israeli filmmaker. 5 BROKEN CAMERAS is a Palestinian-Israeli-French co-production. 

I'm not sure how the confluence of Passover and Easter, and watching a documentary filmed by a Palestinian Muslim co-directed with an Israeli filmmaker, seen through the eyes of a child, relates to Humility within Love, Hod within Chesed.  I think the eyes of a child holds a key...

Life Before Text Messaging

"I love you.  P.S. I'll bring a bread home for lunch."  Today it would be a text message, abbreviated and eventually deleted.  I am touched by the poignancy of my Dad's handwriting, his little drawings, the gold stars stuck on these seemingly daily notes to my mom in the early 1940's.  She had saved them all in a heart shaped Whitman's chocolate valentine box, which I discovered when I was cleaning out their apartment ten years ago.  These love notes are documentation of a vibrant, loving, and sexy marriage, and also of the zeitgeist of an era.  They are a treasure.  

I started this altered book project using Sayings of the Fathers / Pirkei Avot, a compilation of Jewish traditional ethical teachings and maxims with many layers 

of commentary over the centuries. My altered book is still a work in progress. The more I work on it, the more it feels like I am adding my own contemporary commentary, through the story I am telling from my dad's love notes and doodle poems and my mom's jottings.  In Jewish tradition, commentary on any text is also an ongoing work in progress..

 

The two little girls on the right are my mother and my aunt Judy.  I superimposed them on the text that talks about how arguments for the sake of heaven endure.  They loved each other fiercely, disagreed and argued often, but held hands to the end of long lives and did anything to help each other.

I will keep you posted as this project unfolds!