“imagine.....”
© 2008 by Susan Moore 

While recovering from an illness I began thinking about my early childhood friend, Diana.  I was born in Detroit and my family moved to a little town called Holt, Michigan when I was six months old.  Diana and I were friends as early as I can remember, until I was seven and my family moved to Florida. I have many happy memories of our playing together.  We were wonderful friends. I don’t know why, but after we left, I didn’t write.  That time remained a separate little bubble in my mind.  I often thought about Diana, and never had a great friend like that again until I was in college.  

When I started feeling better during my recovery I took a chance and Googled her name.  I randomly went to the tenth page and found someone by her name at an establishment in a town in Michigan.  I called the number and asked the person who answered if she was the Diana who used to live in Holt, Michigan.  She immediately answered “Is this Susie?”  We talked a lot that day, and have talked quite a bit since then. I was amazed that she still had my doll’s cradle.  I had almost forgotten that I gave it to her before I left.  For some reason, that poignant detail  touched me deeply.

 

There were other events during that time in Holt that weren’t as happy as my friendship with Diana.  In reality, I think that’s why I left this time alone, as a bubble in my mind. This drawing was created with the intention of healing the first seven years of my life. I entered a peaceful cocoon and listened to the same soothing music the entire time I worked on this piece.  It was not too different from rocking myself in a cradle. I created what I imagined was the perfect, safe place for friends to play, to imagine, and to discover together.  This is a place where friends don’t have to be separated, and where anything beautiful that a child can imagine is possible.

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World Angel - Invisibilis
© by Susan Moore 2009

Last winter the weather in Washington was extremely cold, with lots and lots of snow.  One evening  I was sitting in the dark, except for a few candles and some Christmas lights.  I noticed how radiant snow is at night, as though it has its own light, and how utterly quiet it is when it snows.  I felt a profound peace and a sense of gratitude for that, because I had not experienced that kind of peace in a very long time.  During that indescribable feeling of peace I saw in my mind, very clearly, a woman who somehow exemplified that peace. Just because we don’t see certain beings doesn’t mean they aren’t there. I began this drawing by trying to capture the essence of that being, and it evolved into “World Angel.”  Months before I started this drawing I gave a friend a bead that was a globe of the earth which I had suspended from a string.  Later, after the bones of the drawing were in place, I recognized that I had once again created the same gift, but in a different way.  That experience of peace, lasting peace, is what I hope for all of us living on this amazing globe, suspended in space.

from Earth  we view the universe . . . . . as souls in motion  the pendulum swings . . . . . . . . . . through the vast curve of space we follow its sway . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . in the power of  white light that  sings we  seek to control or learn to submit . . . . . cycle the seasons  with welcome or woe  . . . . . . . . . . our lives simply fall through the hourglass of  time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . in the end....both our friend  and our foe ©Susan Moore September 20, 2004

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Deep Peace
©2010 by Susan Moore 
A Tribute To Timothy

Timothy Lu Fisher Vetromile   March 14, 1944 - January 4, 2010

Last summer I found I myself longing for my Florida home, and decided to do a tropical underwater drawing. I began doing  research on coral reefs, looking for images that attracted me.  In that process I discovered a most extraordinary creature - the leafy sea dragon.  I fell in love.  It was the most amazing and magical being I had ever seen, rivaling, at least in my mind, with chimerical creatures like the unicorn, the dragon and the phoenix.  

In mythology, chimerical creatures possess a combination of features of various living beings, and therefore retain some of the qualities of each of these beings.  Thus combined, they are magical creatures. The  difference is that the leafy sea dragon actually lives in our world, in the ocean near Kangaroo Island off of Australia.  Sadly, however, a sailor friend of mine has seen them caught in fishing nets here in America.  I decided this creature had to be in my next drawing and spent a lot of time looking at various pictures of them in books and on-line.  School started again, then Christmas break rolled around and the drawing was still not off the ground.  I had not found my other protagonist. 

At the end of my break I called my dear friend Timothy Vetromile, and learned that she was ill.  I realized while I was talking with her that she was dying.  I booked a flight for Tampa, but even before I departed Washington, she had passed.  I was in shock.  This loss was devastating.  What I hoped would be time, probably the last time, spent with my old friend turned into time attending her memorial service.  

This was my first visit back to Florida in nine years. I felt like I was finally on solid ground.  Seeing old friends and my sister Sarah was comforting and heartfelt.  Taking in the Florida land and waterscapes and breathing the saltwater air imbued me with the profoundly peaceful familiarity of at last being home.  Timothy brought me home.  I knew she would be glad.

When I returned to Washington I knew I wanted to create a drawing for Timothy, and finally understood who else would be in the tropical underwater-scape.  TImothy loved tropical underwater.  An artist herself, she had created many underwater scenes in her own zany, unique, outside-the-box style.  After all, her maiden name was Fisher.  This would be my “grieving drawing.”  I had done the same when my parents passed away, two months apart, in 1994.  Perhaps it sounds overly thematic, but I immersed myself in the Gulf of Mexico to create this piece.  The feelings were raw and ran deep, and I did a lot of crying while I worked.  I began this piece well before the oil spill began, but after it started I found myself crying about the Gulf of Mexico, where I grew up, as well as crying about Timothy.  Ironically, they had merged together in an ocean of loss.

Timothy would have loved leafy sea dragons. Like a chimerical creature, the leafy sea dragon appears to be part plant, part seahorse. The woman in this drawing is not a portrait of Timothy in the classic sense of exact representation, but for me she is a spiritual fantasy of the magnificent, inimitable, colorful, magical and extraordinary creature that Timothy was and always will be.  The colors of her dress with fins were inspired by a mandarin fish, but the lacy, leafy shapes of the bottom of her fins and dress were inspired by the shapes of kelp and seaweed, so in a way the woman has the magic of the chimerical about her as well.  

Months after Timothy’s passing, I received a card from her in the mail.  Her husband had found a card addressed to me.  He knew how happy I would be to have a last message from Timothy, and he let me know it was on its way.  It was a card that she had drawn for me.  On the front was an exquisite little drawing in colored pencil, metallic pens and white glitter, perfectly executed.  It was a fanciful purple and blue horse, ornately decorated in Timothy’s own unique style, facing a palm tree on the left.  I immediately saw the connection between my seahorse and her horse.   Not only that, but her horse was purple and blue, like the woman in my drawing.  Just as there was a palm tree in her drawing to the left of the horse, my piece has two tiny palm trees extending from the upper far left, above water.  

Inside the card Timothy had written “Susan, I love you. I hope many good things happen for you in ’10’ ”  I realized this was my Christmas card.    Inserted between the pages of the card was another “Timothy drawing” which she had cut out.  It was a big beautiful   bird in blues and green, with a star and holly berries and leaves spilling out of its long pointed beak. In “Deep Peace” I had already placed this star in Timothy’s heart.    We have always been thus attuned to each other in our hearts.  Front and inside of card and bird are now all matted in deep turquoise and framed in the metallic gold from her palm tree.  It is hanging next to my drawing table.  

I miss her every day, and will for the rest of my life, but it was just like Timothy to send me a last message of love.  

For almost two years I have been listening to a song that brings me peace.  I hope and believe that where Timothy is now, she is experiencing the peace that so often escapes us in life.  This drawing is a tribute to my beloved friend, and the title comes from the lyrics of  this Gaelic Blessing, which has been set to music by composer, John Rutter:

“Deep peace of the running wave to you
Deep peace of the flowing air to you
Deep peace of the quiet earth to you 
Deep peace of the shining stars to you 
Deep peace of the gentle night to you 
Moon and stars pour their evening light on you
Deep peace of Christ, 
Deep peace of Christ to you.”

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Originals and Giclee prints are available by contacting Susan Moore

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