Runaway Foxes V.I. With Ghost, Oil on panel 24x18".

Runaway Foxes, VI: With Ghost
24x18" oil on panel, available at Cole Gallery as part of my August 2022 solo show Pink Lions Paper Crowns

There will be days you cannot run away.
There will be days you are more ghost than girl.
….


“Worthiness is not earned, it is claimed.” It finally clicked. A quote from a yoga teacher rocketed me back in time.
I packed this piece two days ago to go to Cole Gallery for my solo show, after painting it almost a year ago.
When the first 5 in the Runaway Fox series left my studio, for the Vulpine Tap Room, my walls were missing them, but not as much as I was I was.
So I painted No. 6.
And it wasn’t working.


What do we do when a painting isn’t working?
I say it all the time:
We kill our darlings.
We paint over the parts that we loved because maybe that tiny corner isn’t serving the whole composition.
I did a lousy job painting over it.


Whatever. Onward. I’d fix it later.
Then, two foxes came racing, one after the other, bounding across the studio shouldering the ghost fox on the panel.
They boldly took their final poses. One flying high, the other, crash landing. Up. Down. And they didn’t frighten at the sight of the ghost who came before.


I learned many hard lessons from this year of incredible injury: a broken shoulder in the summer, a severe contusion to my sternum/clavicle that made breathing painful for months this winter, and most recently, a wildly painful ankle injury I have no explanation for.


As a marathoner, you see it all the time: people tied up in their PRs, FKTs, Ultrasignup ranks, defining themselves by their ability to run far and fast.
I was that way too, except I was using running to escape and numb what was too hard to confront in the moment. To outrun what I’ve spoken about as ‘bear days’.
I’ve learned over this year of doubt and pain that injury never took running away from me: I had mistakenly tied up self worth and identity in this activity.


You are so much more than what you can do, or used to be able to do.


There will be days you cannot run away.
There will be days you are more ghost than girl.


And now I understand what I was painting was about so long ago.