Letting go and moving on...

I have made a big decision. I will be moving away from working with polymer clay as my first choice as an art medium. This is a hard decision as it is so easy to use polymer to make things that one can never buy. I have used it for sculpting, painting, substrates, crafty things, artsy things and every thing in between. I have even used it to repair electronic equipment! It is as much a part of my life as eating and sleeping. But it is time to move on...

Columnist Ellen Goodman wrote this many years ago.

There's a trick to the Graceful Exit. It begins with the vision to recognize when a job, a life stage, a relationship is over -- and to let go. It means leaving what's over without denying its validity or its past importance in our lives.

It involves a sense of future, a belief that every exit line is an entry, that we are moving on, rather than out.

The trick to retiring well may be the trick of living well. It's hard to recognize that life isn't a holding action, but a process. It's hard to learn that we don't leave the best parts of ourselves behind, back in the dugout or the office. We own what we learned back there. The experiences and the growth are grafted onto our lives. And when we exit, we can take ourselves along --quite gracefully.

This short piece has been a constant for me through many life changes. I read it often when I was going through two divorces, many relationships, making the decision to sell my businesses, deciding to leave Alaska-a place I love, and many other important changes in my life. It has served me well.

So I am going to try to leave polymer gracefully.

I just never know when I will need polymer to do what no other medium will do. I will not sell my stock, but I will only use it when nothing else will work.

Polymer clay is the most versatile medium around, but there are some serious limitations. And I am not talking about the possibility that it does not get respect as a medium! I am talking about the fact that it cannot be completely transparent, it cannot be made into huge pieces (unless done in small parts and then assembled into a whole) and other such limitations. Not to mention the fact that the quality and consistency of polymer clay has yet to be achieved. To this day, I still can't buy one block of SAME COLOR BRAND NAME at one store and it works like SAME COLOR BRAND NAME from another store. Ooops, I said I was moving along--gracefully.

So now recognizing what I have learned from my polymer clay journey... so I can move along gracefully...

1) The medium is not as important as what one does with the medium.

2) I am much too fickle with my art for me to stick with any one material.

3) It has brought many dear friends into my life. (Hi Porro, Jean M., Linda D., Patti O., Donna W., my friends in the Capital Area Polymer Clay Guild and other online groups and many, many more.)

4) I can transfer all that I ever learned from polymer clay into my other artistic endeavors. Just as I brought all of my previous experience of working with fiber and other mediums, I can now add polymer to the list.

5) I had a mental block with painting, but not with painting on clay. By working with the clay, it was much easier for me to learn to paint by using it on the clay or painting with the clay.

I'm sure there are many more lessons that I have learned about myself and others by working with polymer clay and I will add them when I think of them. But for now, it is time to move on.

While I am at it, I will be giving away one piece of my old finished stock of polymer clay art once a week. Every Sunday, I will draw a name from those who make a comment on a post. I will be posting an image of the first giveaway in a future post.

I will also be discounting all of my remainder stock on Etsy. So if you have been wanting a piece of my polymer clay artwork, be sure to check there often. I will add three pieces each day starting at 30% off.

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