Fallopian Tube

April 8, 1995
Acrylics on paper
16” x 24”‍

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The journey – the process – is all.

In June 1996 as part of the massage/body work I was doing with Dana Zia* she had a vision that in a past life I had been killed – beaten to death – as a witch by a mob that was my own community. This was not the only time I was killed as a witch or a priestess. See "My Burning Times" and "Deus Ex Machina". But she said that in dying I had encapsulated my knowledge in a seed and hidden it somewhere on my body. We did a visualization process together – a kind of cosmic treasure hunt – while I looked for that seed in my body. A door opened up and I was in a long tunnel. I recognized the seed and the tunnel from all these paintings.‍

Journal 4/23/95

One of the insights from Susan Walsh during the Hero's Journey process is that my body is my teacher. This was an “ah ha” that I had long known and even talked about but which was revelatory and affirming as she said it. An interesting part of this whole process has been people discovering things about me through my paintings – often, as in this case, things I have long known, but which come to me with a new light when voiced by others. Plus, I’m continually shocked and pleased by how much comes through unconsciously. process is that my body is my teacher. This was an “ah ha” that I had long known and even talked about but which was revelatory and affirming as she said it. An interesting part of this whole process has been people discovering things about me through my paintings – often, as in this case, things I have long known, but which come to me with a new light when voiced by others. Plus, I’m continually shocked and pleased by how much comes through unconsciously. process is that my body is my teacher. This was an “ah ha” that I had long known and even talked about but which was revelatory and affirming as she said it. An interesting part of this whole process has been people discovering things about me through my paintings – often, as in this case, things I have long known, but which come to me with a new light when voiced by others. Plus, I’m continually shocked and pleased by how much comes through unconsciously.

Having finished "Going Inside" I immediately began another painting. I dove into the tunnel which began as the birth canal but which, part way through, became deeper in the fallopian tubes – that passage between ovary and uterus where a hopeful egg travels – where sometimes it is fertilized. I ached with longing as I painted. Sometimes I was the ova. Sometimes the voluptuous folds themselves. The middle (the end? the beginning?) remained empty until the last minute. I had a fantasy that some answer would be revealed to me – some knowledge of the journey’s end or at least its meaning. Was it me the artist? Me the spiritual seeker? Me in community? All, of course, and neither. And no answer. The journey – the process – is all.

* Dana Zia now does Shamanic Astrology