If every part of the ship is replaced is it still the same ship?
Ship of Theseus was painted as a means of working through grief. My partner passed away right as I began the piece. It originally was going to be a woman adorned in fabrics and patterns, and what it turned into was a place to paint memories of things I needed to say goodbye to. I painted sunsets in Hawaii, red cliffs, and silhouettes of us in the snowy woods of our hometown. The funny thing about these memories I was saying goodbye to, is that they already passed. Kindof how memories work.
This is what I thought the challenge of grief was; learn how to say goodbye. Whether it be tears, spreading ashes, screaming, silence, burning belongings... just figure out how to say goodbye.
It wasn’t until mid way through this painting (at the time thinking I was finished) that I simply changed my mind. No dramatic catalyst, just a change of mind.
Nothing needed saying goodbye to. I still burned stuff and screamed a lot but this time in righteous acceptance. What his death needed was acceptance. I seemed to think that accepting was forgiving, and forgiving is forgetting.
Anything but.
Accepting is a bow. And this act lets the water flow again, untethers the wind, and allows the seasons to change. Acceptance of him moving along let me change too, and allow myself to properly finish the painting even if it meant covering up the memories with more paint.
I decided to paint a Keeper of Change. A protector of the path from what was to what now is. An illuminator of Present, surrounded by all that which used to be. Hands outstretched as to say ‘Yes, go…we all were bridges.’
While I was tussling with anger in letting go of the man I once knew, I was blinding myself to what he had become.
He is in my blood, my words, my movements. He is is the laugh lines around my eyes, the paint and the rain.
Now when I miss him, I take a drive on the highway with my hand out the window. If I open it, the wind feels just like he is holding mine. And it’s that simple really.