Last night was my final night of the Art Expression series at The Gatehouse. As usual, I did not like the workshops at first. Then I realised it was just me shaming myself. The same old soundtrack that has been looping since I was a kid. I believed I was a lousy artist. I held that belief like it was gospel.
Does any of this feel familiar to you. Who else out there thinks they are not artistic, not creative, and should never touch a paintbrush or a colouring crayon because their work will never hang at Sothebys for $10million. What a load of rubbish. Who taught us that nonsense. I will tell you who. White supremacy ideologies. The idea that there can only be one winner and you are not it, so put down that colour palette, go work on the assembly line and be grateful we let you through the door.
The truth is this. I am alive today because I have a fight in me. I want to end child sexual violence because it almost killed me. I write about it. I advocate to end it. I witness other survivors so they can feel heard and believed. But the fight is exhausting. And I am exhausted.
So I need a small break. I need to care for my body. I need to give myself gentle kindness, small loving actions. For a while, I am putting down my social justice roar. I am going to focus on healing with love for the next 66 days. That is how long it takes to build a habit by the way. Here is an article for anyone who wants to dig into the research.
Forgive my slip. I fight for rights because of love. It is hard to separate the two.
Back to The Gatehouse. The Gatehouse could also be called The Lighthouse. Why. Because only people who have experienced child sexual violence show up, and we are more than a circle of chairs. With support, conviction, determination to heal and a whole lot of love, we surround you with light. Try bringing darkness into a room full of light. It cannot win.
We were asked to leave the Art Expression programme with a gift. I wrote them a story. They listened. They loved it. And I felt proud. That feeling surprised me. It also softened me.
And this gifting business is growing on me. So here’s a gift I want to share with you. My gift is an act of love. I heal by sharing. It helps me feel seen and valued. Isn’t that what we all want? To feel like we’ve contributed to our community, even in the smallest of ways.
Because of child sexual violence, I live with nightmares. They are part of my life. I have tools and techniques that help me survive them. Thank you Babette Rothschild. Your books have saved me more than once. One thing I learned was to get out of bed and touch 10 things in my home that bring me back to the present. But sometimes I am so exhausted I do not want to get out of bed. So maybe I can stay where I am and look at the things I keep in my bedroom.
Since this work of loving myself began, I have become mindful of the photos I have. Most of the ones hanging on my walls were taken when I was alone in a beautiful place. They brought me peace. But I am in a different stage of awareness now. I need to be surrounded by others. I need to make room for that somehow. The how was not clear until recently.
Thank you to The Gatehouse. You hold me when I cry. You see me. You believe me. And you believe in me.
Here is my gift back.
Towards the end of writing my book, Breathing the Night Out, I realised I am ready to shine. Really shine. Not just through words but through the images I choose to live with. When I wrote the book, I began each chapter with a collage. The collage helped me find the message, yes, but more importantly, it gave me a way to express emotion. The words came later. I discovered this technique by accident in university. It helped me get As. So I carried it into my book. I wish you could see all 78 of my collages. Here is one to give you an idea. It goes with the chapter titled Real Magic. They are my favourite part of the whole project. One day I might find a way to share them. For now, they stay tucked away in my laptop, waiting to shine.
A few weeks ago I saw the cover of an upcoming Canadian book about healing after child sexual violence. The artwork is beautiful. It is spiritual. It is full of courage. But it is not Canadian. It unsettled me. I love the image, yet I would need a passport to visit that landscape. My nieces and nephews, scattered across Canada, cannot go. They live in poverty. How do I show them a world full of beauty if the beauty I point to is somewhere they may never see. Somewhere they can never claim as their own.
People tell me not to think like that. You never know what the future holds. Fine. But what about today. How do we find beauty in our own backyards. And what if we do not even have a backyard. Then we go to a park. We go to a tree. We look closely. The answer is yes. There is beauty everywhere.
After seeing that cover, I wandered around my apartment. My walls carry artwork from my travels. I was once lucky enough to have a career that took me around the world. I was not buying pieces that needed to be insured. Well, one time by accident, but I sold that piece to fund my book and that was money well spent. I also have photos I took myself, images that fill me with joy whenever I look at them.
But when I look at a photo of Canada, something shifts. It is different. I can feel a vibration in my body. It feels like home. As for the poster art from Pottery Barn, those images do very little for me. They are pretty enough, they match the decor, but there is no vibration. No pulse. No sense of belonging.
Then it hit me. I can create art. I can create community. I can express myself. I can feel held when I wake up screaming in the night. I just need to surround myself with images taken by the people I love. I am a project manager after all. So I created a project.
The Project
My nieces and female cousins are taking photos of nature. They each send three of their favourite shots, and I’ll pick one to put on the wall. No buildings. No roads. No animals. No humans. Only nature. Nature is many things, but it is always love. And nature cannot be owned. People buy land and pretend they own it, but nature laughs at us. Every so often she reminds us you cannot own her. You can only respect her and love her. Try sticking a for sale sign on a hurricane.
Look at this photo of Great Slave Lake.
My niece stepped onto her grandmother’s back porch, took the shot and did not even need her coat.
And look at this picture my 13-year-old grand niece, who lives in Northern Ontario, took of daisies. Stunning.
My family is full of talent. I love looking at these photos. I cannot wait to see what my five-year-old grand nephew brings back. He likes bugs. Bugs count. Bugs are family.
The nephews and male cousins are taking photos of animals too. Same rules apply: they each send three of their favourite shots, and I’ll pick one to put on the wall. No buildings. No roads. No humans.
And for anyone who thinks they “own” their pets—think again. A pet allows you to care for them because it helps them survive, but we do not own their souls. None of us owns anyone’s soul. We may be stuck in places we don’t want to be, but our hearts and our souls remain ours.
Here is my frog photo to welcome the bugs.
Yes, I am not a boy, but it is my wall and I love this shot. I crawled on my belly to get it. I pretended I was on assignment for National Geographic. It was a couple of months after my brain injury. A walk that used to take me 30 minutes took three hours. I packed food like I was going on expedition. I was determined to reach that pond. I knew the frogs would sing to me. Have you ever listened to a frog symphony. It is magic. It is healing. It is pure love.
I have only just started this project and already my inbox is overflowing. My phone is begging for more storage. My young family members are running around Canada taking photos so they can be honoured on auntie’s wall. I have tears in my eyes as I open each picture. How precious is that. I feel loved. They feel seen. They are loved. This is love in action.
Now I’m thinking about frames. Growing up poor teaches you how to stretch a dollar, so I went to a second-hand store and bought small wooden frames—nothing over five bucks, nothing bigger than 8×10. Then I grabbed a tiny tin of black paint and a brush.
Now they all match. Except they don’t. And that’s the beauty of it. They’re originals now, just like the photos.
Tip: before you even go to the shops, ask everyone you know if they have old frames they were planning to toss. You’ll be helping them by taking them off their hands, and recycle-and-reuse is love.
Tip #2: if you ever struggle to find gifts for people, this solves it. With the extra frames you will absolutely end up with, print a few of your favourite nature shots and gift them for someone’s wall.
Start a thing. Spread the love.
Once the wall is complete, I will take a picture of it and send it to my nieces and nephews. Then we will all be together. Some of them have not met each other and may never have the opportunity. But we are building this project together. We are loving each other. We are not alone.
I have not even hung the photos yet. Simply receiving them is changing me. I love beauty. I am slowing down to enjoy it. My Grandpa Mac always told me, slow down, you are missing the beauty. I miss him. This project is for him as well. A simple project of love, community and creativity.
I will pass all the Pottery Barn posters along. I need the wall space. Someone else will love them. They served their purpose. Now my walls will hold true expressions of love. Love created by us. Love from Canada. I want images of the Canadian Shield up there too. It is the oldest rock in the world. Four hundred and fifty million years of resilience. Our white culture has been greedy for far too long, but we do not have to continue that story. We can show the world who we are. What we are made of. And we still do not own any of it. But we can honour it.
The main intention of this project is to create accessible, low-cost ways for people to build community through creativity. Those two ingredients—community and creativity—are foundational in love.
And when you mix them? Love will swirl around you. It’s magical.
Together we heal.
Every project needs a name. This one is still to be confirmed. This is where I need you. What should I call it. Help me name this project.