Sometimes despite my best efforts, my dreams seem far out of reach, and the steps required to achieve them too small to make meaningful progress, at least today, this week or this even month.

Do you ever feel this way to?

Currently, my artistic journey feels like a lunar expedition, in which I'm struggling to find the road that leads to Houston. The drive throughs along the way are nice enough, and the soundtrack in the car plays non-stop bangers. Hopefully we'll get there someday...

I trust deeply in the timing of everything, and savor the time takes to bring things into existence. Patience is at times my only real strategy.

Interestingly, I recently delved into the etymology of the words patience and perseverance, and was surprised by how different their moods are today.

Patience, a word that I tend to think of as gentle, comes from the Proto-Indo-European root "peh," which meant "to hurt." Patience transformed to mean "suffering" or "enduring." On the other hand, perseverance came from Latin perseverantia, which meant ‘abiding by strictly.’ To me, patience and perseverance are closely linked, as one must endure the suffering of enduring in order to succeed.

Pirseverando Vinces

This recent heraldic seal acquisition depicts an elephant in a tower, and includes the inscription, "Pirseverando Vinces" which means "by persevering you win."

I'm reminded of a quotation by Robert Collier (no relation), an American self-help author from the early 20th Century, who wrote, “Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.”

I envision an elephant trodding a path to and from water each day with water in their truck. One trip, or even a day's worth of trips, might not yield much water, but imagine how much water an elephant could carry in their lifetime. With an elephant's strength and endurance, all is within reach.

To be of use by: Marge Piercy

The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half-submerged balls.
​
I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.
​
I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.
​
The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil,
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used.
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real.

So, to all of you who may be feeling like your dreams are out of reach or that progress is too slow, I encourage you to simply stay the course.

And, above all, never lose sight of the beauty and joy that comes from creating and pursuing your passions,

Kay