Negative Space and Negativity
Negative space, in art, is the space around and between the subject(s) of an image. Negative space may be most evident when the space around a subject, and not the subject itself, forms an interesting or artistically relevant shape, and such space is occasionally used to artistic effect as the “real” subject of an image. – Wikipedia
Our minds tend to focus on and put as the center of attention what we consider to be the most important part of an encounter or scene. Eyes are drawn to the person or the sunset, while other things like the grass are put into the background as less important. The subject is where the excitement is, isn’t it? The background becomes negative space that gives the subject context and form. The background is often ignored.
This emphasis is a matter of perspective.
In cognitive psychology, flipping an image in one’s mind so that the background (negative space) becomes the center of attention is called figure-ground reversal. A classic example of a “multistable” image that lends itself to figure-ground reversal is the Rubin vase (below) in which the black areas surrounding the white vase form shapes that can be viewed as the silhouettes of two faces. The viewer is asked: is it a vase or is it two faces? Both are correct and the answer is a matter of the viewer’s perception.
Which is the figure and which is the background? Where should our attention lie? Which is perceived more strongly by the viewer? Which is the object and which is the negative space?
The same could be asked of a person.
What is the vase of you, the core of you to which you would like to draw attention, and what is the faces of you, the negative space that competes for that attention? Taken a step farther, when do negative competing images of you overshadow you and put you into the background?
Negativity is like negative space. When I speak of negativity, I don’t mean dealing with a truly difficult real life situation such as an illness or personal loss. I think of negativity more as seeking drama. Scandalous news. Tragic events that one is unable to help. Ruminating over dark ideas. Gossip. Negativity can be addictive and grow to the point where that’s all of a person that is perceived. Do you see a person or their anger, their dwelling in the sadness of the world, their desire to dance with scandal? Do you see the person or the negativity?
A person balances on a fulcrum of figure-ground reversal. Negativity can become the center of attention while the person is overshadowed and goes into the background. The see-saw is yours to control.
What do you want others to perceive about you – the negative space around you or the whole person?
Where should our attention lie when we look at you? Which is the object and which is the negative space?
It’s all happening at once, the good and the bad, the sad and the joyful. Perspective causes the figure-ground reversal, the switch between half-empty and half-full.
And what do you perceive in the world – the object or the dark ground? Do you see vases or faces?
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Life Lessons
Sunboy and I recently started a bedtime ritual where we each share two things about our day: one thing that made us feel happy or thankful, and share another thing that made us feel sad.
Tonight he said, “I feel happy that Airplane (the cat) let me pet him for a long time.”
“That’s really special. You two are really becoming friends,” I replied.
“Yup. My sad thing is that Daddy took a car away from me.”
“I’m sure he had a reason. Why did he take it away?”
“I don’t know. Something about sharing.”
“You know,” I said, “a punishment is given to teach you a lesson. It’s important to focus on the reason for the punishment. It’s not about the car, it’s about the sharing. We want you to be the best Sunboy you can be, although you’re already pretty great.” We snuggled closer.
At this point I paused. I wondered if we were expecting something from him that is challenging for adults to grasp. How often do we understand the lesson that life is trying to teach us? Like losing a toy car for not sharing, the lesson often isn’t an obvious representation of the mistake that we made. Plus, it’s difficult to avoid inserting ourselves and our inherent biases into the interpretation of a lesson that life has for us. It’s easy to lose perspective and wallow in subjectivity. Lesson lost. Mistake to be repeated at a future date.
Well, that seems rather dismal, doesn’t it? And besides, we know that isn’t true. Most of us make it out of the primordial soup.
So, I thought about it a bit more. Obviously, we learn our lessons and evolve. Or, at least we try. Some lessons are learned easily. The worse the mistake the easier it is to avoid repeating.
Other lessons are a slow evolution of subtle changes and assessing the results. Relationships are like that.
My favorite lessons are learned suddenly as an epiphany. The sudden shining down of knowledge from the universe, bright as a million suns. I stand in the shining brilliance of an epiphany as I steady myself on the furniture. Wonderful.
In the end, it doesn’t really matter how we continue to learn life’s lessons and grow. It’s more important that we learn them, and that we never stop growing. Adults struggle with learning lessons because adults are a work in progress, like overgrown children. It’s a good thing too. A stagnant life is the ultimate in lessons lost.
Perhaps the best lesson to teach Sunboy is this: try to identify the lesson in a mistake. Take it as sunlight from which to grow, all the days of your life. And don’t forget to share both the happy and the sad with someone you love.
Happiness Dandelions
One afternoon when we were outside, Sunboy asked for a bucket to fill with dandelions. Not just any dandelions. Happiness Dandelions.
“I’m picking dandelions to make our family happy, he said. They’re flowers,” Sunboy explains.
“But our family is already happy,” I say.
“More happy.” The wisdom of a child.
I went inside and found a container to collect the Happiness Dandelions. Sunboy was thrilled. Flowergirl quickly joined in. The three of us cleared the hillside of its dandelions.
At one point, the Happiness Dandelions spilled. There was a moment of quiet disappointment, then we started recovering them. Together.
Being who I am, this got me thinking.
Like building blocks, we’re made to build up happiness and then break it down and reconfigure it as needed. Happiness isn’t a stagnant state of being. Happiness evolves with circumstances, with life.
Happiness can arise when we see weeds as flowers. The perfect imperfections. The rainbow after the rain. The purity of a child’s secret world. The random works of art.
Later that day, there were Dandelions of Happiness all over my house. I kept finding them. Small reminders of happiness, scattered everywhere. Just like every day. Precious, beautiful weeds.
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Mothering and Motherlessness
Sometimes I surprise myself with how friendly I am to strangers. I smile, laugh easily, joke or commiserate over a shared obstacle, and then merrily go on my way. I stand in a moment of epiphany, wondering if that’s really who I am now: a generally happy, outgoing person.
I spent younger years as an angry young woman. Mother’s Day was like a dark cloud that rained on me every May. Thankfully, my mother is of a religion that considers all holiday celebrations to be immoral, and so ignoring Mother’s Day was construed as respecting her wishes. It took the healing of time and a good deal of introspection to get to a place where I was no longer angry at the world for not having a typical mother.
Of course, my children healed me too. From what I’ve read about motherless mothers I realize that I have probably transferred the idea of a nurturing maternal relationship to my children, only with me in the starring role as mother this time. Do I have a tendency to over-mother my children? You betcha. Yet, through them, I finally have a reason to see the sunlight on Mother’s Day. I thank my son often for his gift of making me a mother, his mother. I am in control of the next chapter of motherhood.
Others complain about their mothers. For a long time, I couldn’t help but wonder why they were complaining. They seemed to have normal, albeit quirky, mothers. I’ve come to realize that motherlessness can arise from different causes – death, mental illness, abandonment and elusiveness to name some – but the overall feeling can be similar. Motherlessness can affect a person differently depending on their life stage, personality and the presence (or absence) of other nurturing, mother-shaped figures. There are motherless daughters, motherless sons and motherless mothers like myself, all with their challenges.
Motherlessness to a mother can feel like learning the trapeze without lessons. The baby is born and we jump off the platform, gripping tight and sailing, looking for the net. It’s hard to tell what, if any, net is there and so we do our best to make our own.
I’ve heard women say they would not know how to be a mother without the guidance of their own. They’re right. Motherless mothering isn’t something you know how to do, and there’s no one to teach you either. It’s something you feel and invent through empathy and long nights staring at the baby in your arms realizing that you are the sole source of maternal comfort. Thankfully, mothering is very much built on instincts, it’s just that the motherless path also includes trips to the emergency room for diaper rash. The feeling emerges that although you don’t know what you’re doing, others could not possibly know your baby as well as you and so you hold tightly, wary to let anyone else care for them. I’ve learned to let go cautiously over the years, and I’ve read that these are common experiences for motherless mothers.
I’ve accepted that I will never have a mother-like relationship in my life. Do I like it? No. Does it surface with grief that sends me reeling from time to time? Certainly. It probably always will, returning like a swarm.
There are many ways of getting to the airport but perhaps only one way to leave, if you want to fly. Peace and acceptance will give you wings.
I’ve found a certain peace – even empowerment – with my situation. I’ve come to realize that the person to whom I am tethered, whom I am obliged to visit, is not really a “mother” as much as it is the person who gave birth to me and did the best she could with what she had available to her. She gave love in her own way, even when it did not feel nurturing. No oasis from the storm, she IS a storm. She will never be better, never be a normal mother, and it’s not her fault. Being angry at mental illness is like being angry at any physiologically-based disease. Nothing productive will come of it. Nothing I do or feel will change the situation or change who my mother is. Raging against the sky will only leave me exhausted and drenched with rain.
My peace with my motherlessness has come from realizing her limitations and realizing mine. Nothing I do will “show her how to be a mother”. If anything, she has given me a powerful negative example as I mother my dear children. She has shown me what happens when you walk off a cliff. Lesson: don’t be a lemming.
My anger would smolder inside if I hadn’t chosen to extinguish it, accepted reality for what it is and moved on. Chosen to live in the present. Chosen to be happy. Chosen to be strong.
There’s a reason why you need to save yourself first. Like the oxygen masks in an airplane, you are useless to others if you don’t meet life with your personal strength intact.
As I negotiate my evolving relationship with my mother, the extent and manner to which I feel tethered to her is my decision. I can respond to her emotionally, I can respond to her physical needs only, or I can choose not to respond at all. None of us asks to be born, after all. I continually carve out the extent to which I am able to have a relationship with her while maintaining myself and prioritizing my responsibility to my children. I brought them into the world, after all.
The more people for whom you are a life raft, the harder it is to swim, and the harder it is to save yourself. Learn to swim first and you can be a life raft to others that need it, on terms that you decide. The balance between mothering and motherlessness.
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A Random Act of Art: Staples
A young college graduate had the painfully monotonous job of removing staples from documents and scanning the documents. It’s what he did all day, full time, for a year. It’s the type of demotivating work that might crush one’s spirit except that he found a way to free his mind. It was something so simple yet laced with subtle rebellion of the type that so many of us engage when faced with repetitive, unstimulating tasks. He channelled his angst into an installation art piece, although he wasn’t thinking of it quite in those terms. As he removed each staple from a document, he placed the staples, one by one, into a pile instead of throwing them away. He created something from the endless, mindless work. I see both the weight of oppression and the triumph of liberation when I look at it.
Beautiful, isn’t it?
It became a statement about the resilience of the human spirit in the face of tedious and ceaseless drudgery. At least that’s how I saw it. He was surprised when I asked if I could take a photo of his staple pile. Both he and his mother were surprised when I said that I considered it a piece of art.
His staple pile reminded me that scientists often save scraps of aluminum foil from their lab work. The foil is accumulated square-by-square from the tops of autoclaved glassware and growth media for bacteria and yeast. The collected foil is used to construct a shiny, silver foil ball during their years in that lab. The ball can get so large and heavy that new foil must be pounded on old to make it stick. I’ve seen solid aluminum foil balls that were packed tightly and larger than a grapefruit. The foil ball becomes a symbol of years of faithful lab work, regardless of the outcome of the experiments. When they leave the lab, the foil ball is either saved, passed down to a younger labmate or recycled.
Having a creative side-project can feel liberating in the face of dismal tasks. It’s a statement that a thinking, creative person is doing these tasks, and their mind is still free. You can make my hands do what you say but my mind is my own. To me, this is art.
Another Random Act of Art can be found here.
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The sensuality of reading books
I love when a book succumbs to being read. Its pages soften, its spine relaxes. It forms itself to me. It knows it’s mine. The book unfolds itself to me like a new relationship blossoming under my fingertips.
Effects of many reads, softened and tabbed. ee cummings Tulips and Chimneys, Sharon Olds The Dead and the Living, Louise Bogan The Blue Estuaries
Much of what I read for pleasure is poetry. Reading poetry is different than reading a novel, at least for me. I don’t read poems in the order they appear, but rather pop around looking at passages, stopping to savor poems that speak to me. I love the succinctness of poetry, its vivid expression, its metaphors, and how captures the echos that reverberate within. Poetry is like having the right side of your brain describe what the left side of your brain can’t explain. If poetry itself can be difficult to explain logically, then it makes sense that the relationship one has with books may be based more on feeling than rational decisions. Like a relationship. The relationship can be rather right-brained and based in the senses:
The familiar feel of the book cover.
The tightness of the spine.
The scent and texture of the paper as the pages are turned.
The font and spacing on a page.
The way a book changes and relaxes with being read. People are no different in this regard.
The manner in which I mark a favorite poem tends to be specific to the particular book. I tend to tab certain pages, but in some cases, the tabbing has become ridiculous. Sometimes I use a different tab placement or color as a sort of temporal stamp of when I liked a poem, or whether or not I wish to share the poem with others.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Sonnets of the Portuguese, tabbed
Other times, I decide that dog-earring feels appropriate for a book. My hands alter the page of a loved poem as I read it longingly, folding the corner of the page to make it shorter than the rest. The page has lost its factory-pristineness in my hands. The poem and I move one another. I suspect that Anne Sexton would approve.
Anne Sexton's Love Poems, dog-earred
Fiction can be different than poetry. Many times I won’t mark any pages of a novel. Still, a long book takes longer to read and so the pages have more time to give way and mold themselves to my hand. Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead was like that. I didn’t rush through Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance so we had plenty of time to get acquainted. Both are paperback books with nice soft spines.
And what could be better than a book that was lovingly handled by the author to sign it?
Or one that was handed down by a loved one?
From my grandmom, with the note "Thoreau and his words have always made me feel better after reading them!"
I love to look at books I haven’t read in a long while and discover the treasures within. Sure, I linger over the passages I have marked in some manner, but I also enjoy looking at any bookmarks left between the pages. Impromptu bookmarks are the best kind of bookmark: a concert ticket, a letter, a leaf. These items bring back memories of when I last read the book. I remember that flower but can’t quite place its origin. Who is the letter from? What concert is it? Look at the year!
Used books are like finding forgotten gems. At one time, I attempted to find all original Edna St Vincent Millay poetry that was out of print as individual offerings yet could still be found in used book stores. I always prefer the format of the original printed book to that of later compilations or re-issuings. The way I see it, the author’s original intent was for the book to be considered as one offering, devoured as one chunk. Perhaps a book represents a certain time in an author’s development or thinking, as step along the ladder. One of the reasons I love Sylvia Plath’s Crossing the Water is that it represents a transition between the more youthful The Colossus and the spellbinding Ariel. The transition can be lost in compilations. But I digress. Some Millay books that I found in used bookstores have inscriptions in them, one from 1939. All the books show indication of being well-loved by their original owner. Formed to their hands, now forming to mine. Slowly we get acquainted as I linger on my favorite pages.
Of course the sensual aspect of reading a book and feeling it release its contents is lost on computers and electronic reading devices. The entire tactile experience of reading is made sterile. My copy of Catcher in the Rye feels different than your copy, I am certain of it. Read an e-copy and they’re all the same. I think there’s a place for electronic reading (you’re doing it now) but books are interactive and are more than the sum of their written words. Books can never be truly replaced. I’m sure this is crazy talk to some.
How crazy am I really? Well, I like to arrange my poetry in a certain way on my shelves. I’m not so particular about other literature genres, as long as they are organized by topic or type: art, gardening, fiction. I get more involved with poetry. My early Confessional poets are grouped together so I can imagine the authors chatting as they once did: Plath, Sexton, Lowell, Snodgrass. Far away on the shelves from the Confessional poets I have Louise Bogan (next to Theodore Roethke in homage to their romance). Sharon Olds is next to Galway Kinnell, since they both taught at the same university. Passionate more than crazy, we’ll say.
The Complete Poems of Emily Dickenson, tabbed
But there’s more. Years ago while in graduate school, I would go into the local big chain bookstore and browse the poetry section. It didn’t take long to realize that it was chronically out of order, sometimes with a certain author’s work spread randomly around the section. I found myself straightening the poetry section. It became a meditative task. I was doing it for the authors, I’d tell myself. I focused on my favorite authors, of course, and in some way those books who found their way into the hands of their eventual readers bear the impression of my care for them along their journey. The pages of the books became a little softened in my hands and ready to release their beauty. Primed for poetry. Relaxed for reading.
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My Children’s Books
Toddlers ravage their books. They devour them, quite literally. They tear their favorite page out of a book to keep with them always. It strikes me that part of socialization involves teaching children not to destroy books during a thrilling reading session but to cherish them. Holding a book gingerly like a loved one’s hand means that they can be enjoyed again in the future. Responsible book ownership is a lesson that clearly takes time to master. In the interim, a well-loved book can develop into a type of interactive art piece that reflects a child’s personality and energy.
I treasure books with softened and rumpled pages and weakened spine. These books hold the memories of being read. They encapsulate a cherished time in my children’s lives when they were first learning to love books and the magic they hold within. Some books come alive more than others. Goodnight noises everywhere.
Orchid answers the phone which was ringing in the Goodnight Moon room while the kids enjoy the rabbit's bed
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Who Has Advice on Sibling Rivalry?
Some advice, please… My children love each other. They really do. The first time they met it was magic. They play together well considering their four-year age difference and are affectionate with each other. Sunboy was thrilled the first time that Flowergirl said that she loved him. Of course, these are not reasons why I need advice.
Flowergirl and Sunboy meet for the first time (Flowergirl is less than a day old)
It was bound to happen. Hints of jealousy have begun to emerge. Just now. I feel like if I handle jealousy issues well when they first emerge, it will go a long way. A proper setting of tone, perhaps. It may be delusional thinking on my behalf. Are siblings inherently competitive with one another? Is there little that I can do to set a good precedent?
As an only child, I can’t relate to what they’re experiencing. I can only guess what it would be like to be a young child and feel like I have to share my parents with someone else. I imagine the experience is different for Sunboy who had me to himself for four years than it is for Flowergirl who has always had a brother.
The worst example of the sibling rivalry occurred this week. By comparison to what many probably experience it wasn’t that bad but it felt like a foreshadowing of future days. I was giving the kids asthma medicine before bed. First Flowergirl had hers. She began compliantly but soon fought the idea of medicine or even sitting with me. Mama persevered and then it was Sunboy’s turn. Flowergirl protested the switch in positions, saying “No way!”. She turned, nestled her head into her chubby toddler arms and cried. Tears streamed down her face, all because I was giving her brother medicine. Medicine that she didn’t want herself a few minutes prior. I asked her if she wanted to be where Sunboy was sitting. She nodded yes through the tears.
Earlier that day, Sunboy sat in my lap to read a book which prompted Flowergirl to crawl into my lap also. This led to them vacillating between mildly elbowing the other out of my lap and hugging each other in affection. It got to the point where I couldn’t see the book to read it.
I realize that these are both minor incidences, but I’m at a bit of a loss for how best to handle it.
I’ve told them both that the each of them has a place in my heart – one for Sunboy and one for Flowergirl – and that nothing or no one can take their special spot. I’ve talked about family and how a bigger family means more people to love. I’ve told Sunboy that he and Flowergirl will be friends for their entire lives.
Flowergirl’s age (21 months) may be part of the issue at this point. I can’t explain things to her the same way I can explain them to Sunboy, who is six. Then again, what do logical explanations do to mend a feeling in one’s heart?
So, I turn to you brilliant people. What, if anything, helps lessen feelings of sibling rivalry? What is your experience with sibling rivalry as either a sibling or as a parent of siblings? Is there anything that it helps to hear, any books to recommend, anything that I, as a parent, can do to make this easier for my children? Comments are appreciated. I feel out of my element on this one. Thanks.
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Living A Long Time Alone
There’s a book by the poet Galway Kinnell entitled “When One Has Lived A Long Time Alone”. I’ve always loved the title. I, too, have lived a long time alone. First by myself, and now with my husband.
The only child of an only child with parents who separated early, I learned to love solitude. When I grew older, I moved across the country several times without knowing anyone who lived in the state where I was moving. I lived in my own apartment for ten years with only my cat Jupiter for a roommate. And then I married. When my husband and I moved across the country a few years later, it was again to a place 3,000 miles away in which we knew no one.
Soon thereafter, I became pregnant and very ill. Being so new to the area, there was no one to help us. We were alone together. After our son was born, there was no one to tell us what to expect with a newborn. We devotedly wrapped ourselves around him and did the best we could. By the end of his first week of life when family finally came to meet him, we were almost starving for lack of food and had barely slept. By the time he was three months old, I was literally crying from the exhaustion. Due to my pregnancy, prescribed bedrest, and focus on caring for a baby, we knew few people in the area for quite a while. There was no maternal figure in our families to ask for advice. There was also no family members experienced enough with parenting to know that it would be wise to swoop in to help.
That was years ago.
These days, we are still very tired but have learned tricks along the way. There still isn’t a more experienced person to guide us, but we’ve learned to trust our instincts. We gave birth to a second child. We found ways of being that work with our children, for our family. I carved out a career that provides a measure of balance. We have made good friends. We have two cats instead of one. We bought a house and are transforming it into our vision, bit by bit. None of it may make sense to anyone except us. It’s what one does when one has lived a long time alone.
The one thing that I know for certain in living a long time alone? I’ve built it, and it’s mine.
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The Caretaking Dances
On workday mornings, my husband and son are the first out of bed. My husband, whom I call Orchid, chooses clothes for Sunboy to wear and starts making breakfast and coffee. I sleep until Flowergirl wakes up, which usually happens soon after the boys of the house start milling around downstairs. I take Flowergirl downstairs, change her diaper and get her dressed. By the time I put her in her highchair, Orchid is putting food on her tray and the children eat breakfast together. While they eat, I get dressed, grab a yogurt and pour coffee. And so our day begins like an orchestrated piece of music. Written for a quartet.
In the evenings, I make dinner while Orchid plays with the kids. The four of us eat dinner together. After dinner, my husband corrals Sunboy into the shower while I take Flowergirl upstairs for a bath. Sunboy changes into pajamas and meets us upstairs where both kids have their asthma inhalers if they need it. We stand in marvel of two clean children ready for bed. Just for a moment.
At this point, we switch kids. The idea of switching began when I started to wean Flowergirl a few months ago. These days she happily asks for Daddy in the evenings. I miss my special time with her, and hope that we will switch back at some point. For now, I am enjoying bedtime with Sunboy, who is at a rather inquisitive age.
I kiss Flowergirl goodnight. She says, “I wub yoo!” which makes me swoon. I go into Sunboy’s room to read books with him. We read three books or three chapters of longer books every night. Sometimes the reading is forgotten as we digress into long conversations about what we’ve read. Sunboy could talk for hours if you let him, and he has fascinating ideas. But it’s getting late. We turn off the light, turn on his nature sounds, say a prayer, share more tangential ideas, snuggle and eventually sleep. After a little time alone to decompress and catch up on the internet, my husband and I find our way to the couch to exchange foot massages. Our second routine of the day is complete.
Our caretaking dances require little discussion. We know the steps and the timing. We take turns leading. We switch partners. And when the dance is over, we massage each other’s feet.
This post grew out of a conversation with twitter friends about co-parenting routines. Feel free to share your co-parenting dance in the comments, or if you have a post about this, feel free to link.
