The Debris of 2020
I have just done a guided meditation and then an art installation with Rachel Rose Workshopmuse Grief and Gratitude in 2020. Each week, for 4 weeks, we get an email with a link to the website where there are instructions and a video. This week is entitled Feeling it All.
Rachel led us through a guided meditation looking back over 2020. We were then encouraged to find 3-5 objects with which to make an art installation. It didn’t have to be pretty, attractive or good. It could be artistically terrible. It is the process that counts, not the end product. We were then to write a poem or piece of writing about it and give it a title and then underline 3 important lines (I have used bold below).
As she led me through 2020, I had no recollection of what happened in January or February. A total blank. But when we got to March/April things changed. The emotions I felt were quite strong. It surprised me. I wrote:
Tears. Sadness.
Tension. Tiredness.
Decisions & carrying a load.
I then went through the house and collected some things that I felt represented my emotions. I then created this display.
Autumn leaves fall to the ground,
crisp and dry
golden and brown
crunchy underfoot
delicate and easily broken
or soggy and slippery from rain.
Crumpled tissue
weighed down
by a heavy load.
A millstone around my neck
pulling me down
the responsibility of
decisions
decisions
decisions
I’m burnt out
a candle that no longer shines.
Death and decay
funerals with few
weddings postponed
baptisms not booked.
The church building closed
my dining table
became an altar.
Technical problems abound
and yet we kept on going.
From the chaos
arose
new life
new ways of
expressing the old.
Why a feather?
Those who are weary
will be lifted up
as though
on wings of eagles
when they
wait on the Lord.
So I sit and wait.
I wait for Him
who can raise me up
to once again
fly
and
shine
with His love and strength.
I wait.
I’m sad
And drained
but not without hope.
I entitled it The Debris of 2020. This was a worthwhile exercise and meditation. I was surprised at the strength of emotion, the sadness at all the year that will be forever remembered as the year of Covid-19, the year the church buildings were forced to close. I hope that in 2021 we are able to come out of the pandemic stronger and better than we went into it.
I will keep my installation for a while, and so moved the things onto a board for ease of moving it. Think it looked better against the wood of the table, but its impractical to keep it there.
Elizabeth Jones' Diary 