Leave the coast and make an art farm
Leave the coast and make an art farm
Intuition vs Depression, midwest residency dreams, and building lasting friendships
Yes Yes is a monthly advice column for paid subscribers of the Monday Monday newsletter. Sometimes in podcast form, today it comes to you in written form
You are welcome to leave comments at the bottom and submit your anonymous questions for next month. You are welcome to share screenshots on social media.
A portion of February’s paid subscriptions goes towards the Dancing through Prison Walls Fundraising Campaign : also stay tuned for special edition prints to raise even more funds
In today’s written advice column of the Yes Yes series we tackle questions around being a bullied kid struggling to make adult connections, leaving the big cities to return to midwest homelands and create artist residencies, and leaning into the practice of knowing what is our intuition and what is depression
💎 How do we know when we’ve stayed too long? (Hint - things get fucking miserable)
💎 Do big cities really need us? Will starting an artist residency be fun?
💎 How do we find community when we are overly sensitive and mistrusting of others?
Enjoy! For long time Yes Yes listeners/ readers : I’d love to know in the comments : are you missing the podcast format? Loving reading the written form instead? Want both?
READER’S QUESTION : Hi Mar. First off I love your work, your writing, your dancing and your workshop offerings. I took Everything is a Sunset a few years back and it was so great. Thank you for all you do and how generously you share.
I'm an almost 40 year old mother of three, dancer/choreographer, Pilates instructor, body worker. I grew up in central Illinois and as early as possible fled to the coast. In my 20 years away I've been incredibly fortunate to live and work in North Carolina, Los Angeles, Brooklyn, Oakland and now San Jose (CA).
Like many of us millennial creatives with kids, my partner and I are struggling to raise our kids in an expensive coastal city away from family. We love CA but it also feels impossible to do what we want to do here. We are seriously considering moving back to central Illinois, to the town I grew up in. There are many things drawing is there, mostly family, but also the dream to start an "art farm" where we can host residencies, teach our respective art forms and give back to a community that gave me so much. I'm both very excited and very scared about this idea. I love when you share about living in Michigan and choosing to be a creative outside of the coastal city places. Any thoughts, advice or encouragement you have for choosing a smaller Midwestern existence would be so welcomed.
Thanks!
DEAR READER! LEAVE THE COAST! COME TO THE MIDWEST! START AN ART FARM! WE NEED YOU WE NEED YOU!
Think of the lush spaciousness, think of the possibilities, think of the expansive amount of land you could steward and offer back up to the people! What a holy opportunity of space making and shape making and dreams come true!
Ok but, California, I get it. I moved there, then I moved back. Then I moved there again. It has a pull! The ocean?! Get out of here! But let me tell you a few things about living in the midwest, let me tell you about the fly over states, let me tell you about the sweet devotion to home