I have been a fan of Georgia O’Keeffe since high school and was flipping through the Living Modern book I bought at the Brooklyn Museum’s pivotal exhibition on her life, dress and work, and came across this musing she wrote. (Is it a poem? I am not sure.) It reminded me that when you do work you love, it is always forefront in your mind. And if you can find work you are passionate about, how fulfilling it can be. That said, finding work that pays the bills and makes you happy is not always easy. I have had jobs I was not passionate about; it can be debilitating. TFI and sharing other women’s stories is a great passion for me. And it is on my mind 24/7–which is why Georgia’s words resonate for me.
“One works I suppose because it is the most interesting thing one knows to do.
The days one works are the best days. On the other days one is hurrying through the other things one imagines one has to do to keep one’s life going.
You get the garden planted.
You get the roof fixed.
You take the dog to the vet.
You spend a day with a friend.
You learn to make a new kind of bread.
You hunt up photographs for someone who thinks he needs them.
You certainly have to do the shopping.
You may even enjoy doing such things
You think they have to be done. You even think you have to have some visitors or take a trip to keep from getting queer living alone with just two Chows.
But always you were hurrying through these things with a certain amount of aggravation so that you can get at the painting again because that is the high spot–in a way it is what you do all the other things for.
Why is it that way I do not know.
I have no theories to offer.
The painting is like a thread that runs through all the reasons for all the other things that make one’s life.”
–Georgia O’Keeffe
photo Alfred Stieglitz
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