An opportunity to do the best you possibly can.

So, things are getting a lil weird and I will try to write about hope.

I truly believe in my heart of hearts, the well of my soul: the general public finally understands the existential problem of the anti-vaxxers and anti-science billionaires trying to destroy us. I will forgive you. I have done enough, and I will keep trying to save everyone.

If you missed my last post I am taking a break from plague news.

Everything is plague news now. The general public knows who RFK is, and doesn't like him. People want vaccines. Big deal politicians are fighting for access and states in the U.S. are working together to provide care. Very good.

Mass. issues its own COVID-19 vaccine recommendations

“Those recommendations say that everyone in Massachusetts is recommended to have a vaccine if they are six months of age and older,” Department of Public Health Commissioner Dr. Robbie Goldstein told reporters Wednesday.

massliveGreta Jochem | gjochemrepub.com

I will continue to write about my life which is substantially influenced by the COVID pandemic. Aren't we all?

I have not been to an art gallery or any real kind of public art happening in over five years. I have not been to a museum.

In 2023, I started creating outdoor/street art in response to being socially shut out of every local artist space after everyone dropped COVID precautions.

I am a fine/traditional artist and currently my defaults are watercolor and water-based ink. I also used to perform, but this is about painting.

I created tiny paintings with little minimalist watercolor mice, wrote inspirational quotes on them and pinned and taped the paintings around town. The paintings are very small, the largest: the size of a postcard, the smallest: less than an inch in width.

Literally today, it has been two years since my last pet mouse passed away. I knew Soma Yukihira, a dove satin mouse, was the last one I'd keep as a pet for a while:

The mice paintings and their public display is to honor of the lives of my rainbow-bridg'd pets. I also wanted to remember how to draw mice after I didn't have them around anymore. I studied and drew the mice frequently and became quite good at it.

The real pet mice gave me a lot of encouragement. They were beloved companions during one of the most challenging and isolated times in my life. Mice are the embodiment of courage.

The paintings are:

1 - In an easily removable and non-damaging location. Usually use Scotch tape or push-pins.

2 - Noticeable to the passerby, so utility poles, abandoned electrical boxes, little libraries.

Over the past two years, I've observed what happens to the paintings as they weather the outdoors, what ink fades in the rain or what paint disappears completely. What colors, words and paintings remain. Who takes them down, who takes care of them.

I made these with the intention that passersby would pocket the little paintings and keep them as a reminder to keep their shit together or stand up to bullies.

After dozens of daily walks around the neighborhood, I was surprised to find most of the paintings were not taken down.

A few of the first paintings I put up two Septembers ago still exist where I displayed them, dangling faded teardrops on rain-soaked paper, hanging off a yellowed push-pin stuck to a wooden telephone pole.

Last spring, while I was walking to the store one early afternoon, I saw a woman seemingly taking down a mouse tacked to a pole. I approached her on the sidewalk and asked her what she was looking at. Playing "dumb" to get a live critique.

She replied with: I just think it's really cute. She was not removing the mouse but was fixing and adjusting the piece of paper like a framed photo on a wall.

I have considered this interaction the single greatest compliment I've received as an artist.

This was the mouse she was centering:

Someone recently left me a message on another, metal pole, close by where I saw the "I just think it's cute" woman two years ago. This person must have typed this out on a typewriter.

I cannot describe the joy I felt when I saw this message. I have not had anyone really interact with my art outside of the internet in years. And more so that the art seems to be helping someone.

I had to respond.

And someone responded again with an original art piece:

I drew the fox from The Little Prince after playing Sky: Children of the Light with someone who lives in a country which is experiencing a lot of war and political violence.

They told me it was one of their favorite books and the fox one of their favorite characters. I said: me too.

I put it outside of this dry cleaners and at one point it was covered in flyers, at another point someone removed all the flyers but did not take the fox down.

I like to help people, I like to give them hope and inspiration. Because I know that it helps thwart the doom greatly to be regularly reminded that you are alive, and capable of happiness and love.

Maybe someone loves you too.

Maybe this is why I am alive.

You cannot succumb to nihilism. There's a lot of it going around right now. Nihilism is the complete opposite of my entire personality and life. I'm an existentialist.

I have leaned heavily into philosophy since COVID started and since I've been sober, because logic and reason, and striving to be ethically "good", has been both my lifesaver and anchor during these years.

In These Times, you need to be sure of what you believe in. Religion, G(g)od(s) or nothing at all, you have to believe in goodness and humanity to survive the doom. If you don't have an anchor you can easily drift away to troubled waters.

You have to have hope, as hopeless as the situation might be. You have to believe in yourself.

One of the possible side effects of being surrounded by death your whole life, experiencing death of others, losing many people, being at all "close to", is often a profound appreciation for life. I am not an exception.

I have survived violent and dangerous experiences, harrowing long-term hellscapes that most people do not survive. Substance, state and domestic violence, and bad luck and bad health have taken the lives of many people I love, especially in recent years.

When you have escaped certain death, and when you have witnessed death, especially preventable death, you want to tell everyone how important life is, how important love is. The point. The point of it all.

You can go two ways with excessive death and doom and trauma. You can give up or you can get to work. You can decide to live. You can honor the dead by honoring life. And honoring the lives of others who are still alive with you.

All in all, yes, we all die. You can see that as defeatist and give into this nihilism bullshit, or you can see it as an opportunity to do the best you possibly can.

I love you. I will keep repeating.

🦋Follow me on Bluesky.

If you want to purchase high-quality masks and PPE, I recommend Bona Fide Masks.

I accept donations.