Honoring Our Losses

It’s been a while since I’ve posted about whales or art. I had been blogging about how local Orcas, the endangered southern residents, don’t have enough salmon to eat and I needed to take a step back for two reasons. First, salmon reproduction is complicated and with my limited natural science background it’s pretty confusing. (I do intend to revisit river systems and their salmon hatcheries later.) Secondly, most of what I was learning was laced with sadness.

Without really planning it, I ended up facing the sadness by designing a new set of prayer flags to honor nine Orcas that died between January 2016 and January 2017. Perhaps connected to my overall grieving for the many of the changes I see in our world, I needed to retreat to the healing actions of artmaking.

Whatever your opinions are about worldly events, losses are happening. The soothing discipline of carving stamps and playing with color helped me use art to honor what we’ve lost. You’ll be able to see the completed “Orca Memorial Prayer Flags” shortly. (A previous limited edition of Seven Seas Prayer Flags is no longer available.)

I’ll continue to share ways I try to make peace with my personal reactions to climate change, global pollution, and their effect on whales. My hope is that, building on my background as both an artist and psychologist, I can inspire others to choose their own personal ways of responding, ones that fit their inner and outer lives.