The Plan

    “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail,” I said to my oldest son as he vividly recreated a scene from his future life. A day where he would want for nothing; be creatively challenged; give his mother a paying job; and have a PPO plan to stay healthy. (No, I didn’t add that last part, it’s actually a concern of his.) The scene my son recreated was a plan which I can relate to. I had those same kind of plans. They are not just the plans of a dreamer, they are the plans of artists. All artists have a vague plan of how their life will go, without really figuring out how to get from one step to the next. That would be against their spirits… against the grain of what true artistic freedom is all about. Living life without a net.

       I have friends who are able to do their art, or craft, at their own pace. They never hold down regular jobs, or work regular hours, and they get to take dream vacations I can only swoon over. I always wonder… are they trust fund babies, or do their parents fund their dreams, believing their child is unique in their creative endeavors? My parents were artists, but gave up their dreams to raise a family, buy a house, and pay bills, with a little left over for the annual family and friends pilgrimage to Laguna Beach in the summer. They didn’t save for their kids to go to college; or help get started in careers; or in my case, to fund my artistic dreams. They didn’t believe in life insurance, or inheritance for they were still artists at heart, and that never came into focus.

       In my second year of college at California Institute of the Arts, I had to struggle to eat. Going to college for lack of a better path in my life at the age of 22, I funded my education with loans I had taken out on my own through my father’s credit union. My parents believed if you really wanted to go to college, you’d support yourself, which in turn would make you value the degree more. After my first year of commuting to and from my parents house, I decided it was easier to sleep on the dorm room floor of one of my buddies. They helped me out when I couldn’t afford to eat with peanut butter sandwiches, and the occasional splurge of jelly.

       I remember going back to my neighborhood for a party at an old friend’s house. Her family was more financially stable than mine, and she was on her way to a sensible degree in a sensible field. We were all sitting around drinking, listening to music, and reminiscing when she said “Wouldn’t it be fun to be a starving artist, living out of your car? Free to live off the land, and create art? I think that would be so fun!” Really? You’ve got to be kidding me, is what I thought. You have no idea.

       Within my first year of college, I met my husband, whom I married a year before graduating. After five struggling years, I was able to walk across the academic stage with a Bachelor’s Degree in Music, and the realization that it wasn’t going to put food on my table, nor money in my pocket because I didn’t love it that much. I went into the business side of the music industry, and my husband, who was also a musician, became a struggling artist. Although I was able to maintain a meager lifestyle as he attempted to make a name for himself in an unforgiving industry, it wasn’t my idea of the romantic artist’s life. I soon fell out of love with the industry, and went to work in the business side of advertising. With this job, my husband’s gigs, and borrowed money from both of our parents, we were able to buy a house, and have children.

      Soon my husband became the professional musician he had always dreamed of, and was well on his way, performing in front of thousands. But with all this notoriety, the financial picture never changed much. It was feast or famine, as the artist’s life so often is. As he toured, we agreed that I would stay home with the kids to give them some stability. I was busy, and he was busy, and we worked hard at keeping our little family close. There was no plan, just to keep doing what it was we loved to do, and keep the family united.

       The other night I asked my husband of 27 years if he really envisioned our life like this. Did he think we’d still be struggling financially; living in a house that was way too small for us; wondering where our next paycheck would come from; and still borrowing from our parents? Did he know that by the time we hit our 50’s our income would dip so low, our insurance would be cut off? “No”, he said, “I didn’t think there was a timeline.” No timeline? No plan.

       I’m not sure what the answer is if you’re an artist who has yet to hit the creative and financial jackpot. Do you keep plugging away at your craft, daring to fight those windmills that threaten to drag you into the 9 to 5 life of the average human being? Do you wake up every morning with the rose-colored glasses that enable you to convince yourself that life is still keeping you in the pink, and it‘s only a matter of time? Or do you put your art in the “hobby” category, and leave it for the day you retire from your sensible job which allowed you to live a life free from financial worry? 

   
       Author Wendell Berry said, “It may be when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey.” I am at that crossroads now, and with this in mind, I shall begin a new plan. A new timeline for the second half of my life, and it will involve being that artist I have always envisioned. I will create with the love and passion I once had before college, and perhaps somehow this will bring with it the financial freedom I so desperately crave. But if it doesn’t, I resolve to accept that this is the path I chose to take simply for the love of my art, and the peace it brings to my soul. My plan, I guess, has always been to be at peace with my choices, and not tormented by them. As an artist, and creative spirit, the timeline has not been as important.