Snow

I wrote this yesterday~
(I might animate something with this at a later date)

Snow (or Snow Fall)

It was the first garden I had ever planted, it was my own, on my own land. When the storm came, it buried me and my garden. It was as if the garden had never even existed, I could only see the cold desolate snow that laid upon it. For years I just lay there, far removed from the rest of the world. Only to see the every now and again presence of someone coming to pluck what remained and leaving me behind.

As time rolled by another storm came, stronger and much more devastating than the last - this one threatened to take me away completely. I was thrown far away from the garden. When the storm was done reeking it's havoc, all was lost, I was alone and I awoke to find myself at a cross roads. I could stay here in the damage or I could leave.
After all those years of lying there in the snow, I finally rose up and chose to leave.

I could never return to that garden, I had to start all over again from the beginning, in a new place. I vowed to myself and to others who had suffered from the storm, to stay away from the cold this time. I would make my garden bigger and better than before, I would nurture it so that it bloomed the most beautiful flowers possible. I would water it every day and pull all the weeds out as they arose. And I did all of these things, and my garden flourished.
Years passed so quickly that I wasn't even aware of storms anymore, I was completely focused on the gifts growing in my garden and I was happy. My garden was so fruitful that I began uniting my garden with others, and we had strong and healthy mergers and moved forward together.

One day I was walking down the path to my garden, as I did every day, I noticed an ice patch, I turned to find that there was a chill there, that was not before, standing beside me, telling me to walk across it, so I tried and I continued on. The next day I walked down the path and there was even more ice, and again I was encouraged by these new journers upon the path, on the third day it became obviously slippery, and dangerous and again it was insisted that I walk on. I don't even think they thought about the ice at all. I don't think they saw my danger, but I recognized it.

I could feel the storm brewing, I didn't want to get caught up in it again, I thought about it, I looked at all the beauty that had been grown here in this new place, I felt proud, I felt success, I felt safe, I felt love I felt all things good. I had tried those few times, but I knew better now than to risk my own life and just surrender to the storm by walking down that frigid path. For this path, looked like the path that led to that storm that so destroyed my previous garden.

Perhaps the chill that tried to push me down that slippery path could make the trek, perhaps it was of no difference to them than the path they have walked, but I knew different for myself. I worked hard to grow my new garden, and I would not allow the snow to bury all that I had done, especially considering that I had others depending on me. Others like myself ate from this garden and shared it with me and help me grow it. And, there are others that I am expecting to come to my garden, and I want it to be the best it can be when that time comes.

I made a decision, that I would not walk down that path and accidentally slip, for if I can see the risk ahead of time, would it be an accident? I could not chance it, not one slip, not one snow fall.
So I built a new path so that I could enter my garden from a safe place, from a new direction and leave the icy path alone, so I would not fall and fail the garden that I had built up. I returned to my warm and sunny earth, and shared the gifts with those who helped me and held my hand all the way down the path and into the garden.

No need to follow a path just because it is there, or because it is expected of you, if you are sent down an icy path, you are not obligated by anyone to follow, it might be okay for them, but if it is not for you, follow your own path. You are obligated to yourself and you are more and your garden will flourish if you do so. This is the path of no regret.
And the garden, the garden is me.


Copyright Gina Miller 2007 all rights reserved, no portion of this material may be copied without permission from the author.

Artwork published in "Music Game Book"

My Moby image has just been published in the newly released (12/30/06) book called "Music Game Book - A World History of 20th Century Music" which is available at Amazon.com. It's a very lovely book brimming with full color photos and interesting lay outs. It's quite unique in it's use of questions and page cutouts as a form of interactive quizzes, it's sort of a musical Trivial Pursuit in book format. I received my copy from Paris today (where it was published by Assouline), it has a very interesting cover (by the way the image on the front is supposed to look pixilated like that). The cover material itself is something in between a hard and soft cover, it's almost a hard cover but thin enough that it can bend and be flexible. I am assuming that we might be seeing more of these hybrid covers in the future. Best to all! Click the images to see larger versions of the book cover and the page my artwork is featured on.

Happy New Year 2007

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season!