What's In A Name?

I've had a lot going on lately.  That may be reflected in how little I've been blogging, and also in the chaotic-crazy manifested in this art journal page I completed yesterday.

I hate it, and I love it.  

"What's in a name?  Everything & nothing, all at once."  So, true, right?  I'm not planning to get up on a soap box here, but let's see what comes pouring out of my brain and through the keyboard, and perhaps edit back from there...

Names are simple identifiers.  I love that when Jillian was a toddler she started calling us Mama Lisa and Daddy Mike to distinguish us from all the other parents at the park.  She wasn't calling for the attention of some generic "mom", she wanted HER mom to respond.  Brilliant, I say!  (And, a cute aside:  she didn't want us to use the MIKE-ro-wave for any of her food--we needed to use the JILLY-wave!)  Yes, names are simple identifiers that make for more efficient communication.

Then there is the old sticks-n-stones adage.  I think it is pretty much common knowledge that name-calling and verbal abuse has a very real and powerful effect on the psyche.  Not that common knowledge means there aren't buttheads out there that engage in it.  (Ironic, eh?  See what I did there? It is just so darn easy to resort to name calling!)

Oops.  I painted and stamped over my ampersand (&).
I'll keep searching the magazines and add one in when I find one.

And labels.  Don't get me started on labels.  Alright--a little bit on labels:  Person-First Language.

Person-first language is a concept I learned about, and is encouraged by my local autism support group, Santa Clarita Autism Asperger Network (SCAAN).  The idea is to put the person before their disability when speaking or writing about the person, because a person is not defined by their disability.  For example, "She HAS autism," not "She IS autistic." Autism is only ONE of the MANY traits that define her.

Ok, So back to this journal page.  I've been soul-searching lately, trying to get to know myself on a deeper level, and define some goals and a path for myself.  And feeling at once lost, because I don't have a label for myself, and feeling that that's FINE.  Except...wouldn't this be easier if I could just have a simple identifier??  

I carved this stamp when I was taking Julie's online class.  This assignment was to create a damask stamp.  I wanted to do something original, but struggled with free handing a symmetrical design.  Many times when I feel artistically befuddled I turn to ideas and projects I remember from elementary school.  Do you remember name art?  You fold a piece of paper in half and write your name along the creased edge, cut it out, and unfold.  I wrote my name, scanned it, inverted it, and placed the mirror image next to the original scan.

Then I sketched a design out of it, transferred it to a piece of Speedy Carve and made this stamp.  I love it!    It's so cool!  It's just my name, and yet it is so much more than that!

I went berserk with it on that art journal page.  And as I stamped, all this "stuff" about names, and labels, and the various "hats" we all wear, and the impossibility of defining oneself, and changing one's name to a symbol doesn't help any because people still need a verbal identifier for you so you never get away from just being "Prince."  

Names.  So simple.  So complicated.  Who am I?  Really, that is what I am trying to figure out.  In the meantime, just call me Lisa.

Thanks for visiting!