BY KIMBERLY MAYER
“Inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that’s where you renew your springs that never dry up.” Pearl Buck
Traveling east in a van on Rt. 188 the earth turned red and glacial boulders, large and rounded, studded the hills. Behind us was San Diego, ahead was more of this mountainous landscape as we twisted on a narrow winding road between the desert and the sea. Tecate, a city that straddles both sides of the border, is where we disembarked. And there, with Customs officers and the formidable wall behind us, we were ensconced for a week in Rancho La Puerta, a sprawling Wellness Resort and Spa in Baja California, Mexico.
It isn’t on every trip that we carry intentions, but that’s precisely what I’d brought with me. The intention to resume daily meditation practice after all these years, and to paint and draw again. In this way I arrived at a place I’d never been before in hopes of finding some things I’d lost along the way: a Transcendental Meditation(TM) mantra long forgotten, and a hand in art that, over the years, had given way to writing.
There began the inner journey. “When we engage in a creative recovery,” writes Julia Cameron in The Artist’s Way, “we enter into a withdrawal process from life as we know it. Withdrawal is another way of saying detachment or nonattachment, which is emblematic of consistent work with any meditation practice.” Much like checking passports into the safe, our cell phones were tucked away for the week. I know I’m not alone in saying I left sleepless nights over the war in Ukraine back in the states. War doesn’t go away; we were just less embedded in it.
Brick paths wound through 32 acres of naturalized gardens in the 4000 acre chaparral landscape, and our casita was a good distance from everything, by design. Walking like that, in nature and by oneself, is meditative in itself. The rituals I treasured all week were Morning Pages, Meditation, Poetry as meditation prompts, and Sound Healing. I learned the simple truth that all meditation works, it needn’t be TM. I bypassed spa treatments, avoided arduous exercise, and walked endlessly.
A labyrinth in the woods called to me. My creative life was nothing if not a spiral path.
Every writer will know that The Censor is something we deal with constantly in an effort to keep her out of the room. The Censor is perfectionism. So what did she do but grab her post over the years as guardian at the door of artwork. I couldn’t get in. Here at The Ranch sat a sweet little art studio, empty most of the time, full of supplies, and a sympathetic instructor who strolled through now and then. Somehow I gave myself permission, and from then on nothing could keep me out.
There is so much joy in painting like a three year old again! Drawing is harder, but I worked at it, loving that the instructor called gum erasures “Prozac for artists.” Like Morning Pages there were no good drawings or bad drawings. It doesn’t matter at all; it only matters that I’m doing it. I’ve got this! I thought.
I had to come all that way to unblock—and now I had to figure how to bring it all home with me: the meditation practice and the practice of making art. The week was ending and as if on cue the climate was warming, time for me to migrate north. A writing hut awaits me on San Juan Island, which will now be shared with sketchbooks, charcoal, kneeded gum erasures, blending stumps, brushes and watercolors. Oh what a happy little hut it will be.
Like the Englishman who went up a hill but came down a mountain, from here on out I’ll be painting and drawing if not writing.
a little elbow room
a little elbow room 
Going to read it right now
Sent from my iPhone
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Kim, I felt present as you walked me and other readers through your inner journey at the Wellness Resort. It was a gentle walk yet I stumbled when you bypassed the spa treatments. I thought, “you passed up these rare (for me) comforts!”. I promptly regained by footing and was able to continue my contemplative stroll with you. Thank you. Love you, Beth
On Tue, Apr 5, 2022 at 9:27 AM Elizabeth Yourgrau wrote:
> Going to read it right now > > Sent from my iPhone > > On Apr 5, 2022, at 12:13 AM, a little elbow room comment-reply@wordpress.com> wrote: > > > a little elbow room posted: ” Untitled by Cy Twombly BY KIMBERLY MAYER > “Inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that’s where you renew > your springs that never dry up.” Pearl Buck Traveling east in a van on Rt. > 188 the earth turned red and glacial boulders, large ” >
You are a riot. I had my hands full with what I had to do. I know I can be an odd duck even at a wellness resort, but I was on a mission.
I am returned to RLP by this wonderful recollection. Thank you!
Kim, you make me want to take up drawing and painting too! I love thinking of you in your writer’s/artist’s hut.
Come out to the island, Ann, and we can paint together. The table is long, the paint aplenty, and on sunny days we can move out onto the deck.
Sounds like a great retreat, Kim, and I love the idea of integrating visual art into your creative life. Felt like I was right there with you!
We’ve written together, researched together, and now we should draw and paint together. You are always right here with me, Deb.
Kim, such a wonderful, evocative description. Your writing does just to your experience. I wish you much joy in your little hut.
There’s room for us all in here, Tug. Find your beret and come join me.
Kim! How delightful to hear you enjoyed time at Rancho La Puerta (this is a place dear to our hearts). I’m thrilled you experienced your artself again, so fully. I am facilitating process painting sessions online and I hope you’ll come paint with us so I can support your expressive journey now that you’re home from The Ranch. Any of your readers are welcome, too, of course!
I’m there, Katie! And for anyone interested, check out:
https://www.thepaintingportal.com
Katie and I go way back and far away and have a knack for popping up in each other’s life at just the right time. I’m looking forward to these sessions.
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But I bet you will be writing to express your joy in painting!
Good luck!
Alice*
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Alice B. Acheson, Book Marketing/Publishing Consultant
P. O. Box 735
Friday Harbor, WA 98250
360/378-5850
https://sites.google.com/view/alice-b-acheson
a little elbow room wrote on 4/4/2022 9:12 PM:
> WordPress.com
> a little elbow room posted: ” Untitled by Cy Twombly BY KIMBERLY MAYER
> “Inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that’s where you
> renew your springs that never dry up.” Pearl Buck Traveling east in a
> van on Rt. 188 the earth turned red and glacial boulders, large ”
>
Either that or drawing calligraphic images. We’ll see.
Good for you, Kim. Wonderful , happy days are awaiting your return to the hut!
I live in a coastal landscape and I’ve been intrigued with writers who paint (Annie Dillard, Mary Doria Russell). I thought if not now, when?
As always, your thoughts are beautifully expressed and inspiring. Memories of ‘fat farms’ before they introduced exercising the mind! From my cottage, I have a potential painting before me, although I chose photography right now. I will visualize you in your “happy little hut” with thoughts from Agnes Martin, with whom I spent brief time with while living in Santa Fe. Her casita was as sparce as her paintings. I remember one small painting by Elaine Fried, wife of Willem De Kooning. ” My paintings are not about what is seen. They are about what is known forever in the mind.”
Interesting you recall Santa Fe because in my week at The Ranch I thought I was in New Mexico! There’s a certain quality of light, as you well know.
How I’d love to see your photographs, Carla.
I discovered Agnes Martin while living in San Diego. She had a show at the Museum of Contemporary Art in La Jolla, and her paintings spoke to me. Everything was white, I believe, canvases both petite and large, with lines and grids rendered in what looked like pencil. I was a student in interior design at the time and endlessly drafting. I think I gave her my afternoon.