A Journey Realized
2020 will be a time when Lumino branches out, like a mighty tree! I have focused solely on jewelry for the past five years, and the truth is, there are so many other things I can and love to make. I will still make jewelry, have no fear, because that is something I know I have made in a past life and it is something I will make in those forthcoming. It is a craft that—much like the jewels that accompany great shamans, warriors, and queens into their graves—does not die.
There is a pattern of “five years” in my creative life. That is the amount of time I spent in university, cultivating the discipline and learning the wisdom needed to make a living as a multi-faceted artist. Then I spent five years working in a world that often did not make much sense to me, but that's where I was, and I rocked it anyway. When that ended, I spent five years teaching myself the art of silversmithing. This path has been one that gallops alongside the path of my wild heart, which is sometimes hard to find again if it has been lost. Yet here it is, shining, an open road under a full winter's moon.
In the next five years, I see the tree will grow. The seeds of wildflowers and medicine have been planted around it. I see the animals in their different coats peering from the hedge. I have not given up on this very bumpy, muddy, and overgrown road. I have ridden through storms, climbed out of holes, risen from dirt buried upon me, fought off very dark foes, and I have forged on. I am arriving at my tree.
Bloom amongst the chaos of brambles
The Magic Tent
Years ago, I drew in my sketchbook a tent that I envisioned putting up at lively festivals. Beneath that tent I drew tables, and I scribbled in things sitting on those tables that I made. I imagined, and dreamt and saw in visions, mingling with lovely people perusing the things. I look at that drawing from time to time and just keep working toward it, I keep making the things, no matter what.
I'm sure we all hold beliefs that others can call silly, so here is mine:
I believe that magic is real, and that we come to this world to remember we can make magic.
I believe I can make things with my hands, and imbue the only intention I know—the light of Love—into them.
When given to others, I believe this light will grow, like the roots of a tree, down into the places where we cannot see, making the underworld glow.
And so in 2020, I will finally bring my handmade menagerie of things, things wrought with the ancient wisdom of plants, animals, and pieces of earth to spark a new bit of love into a world that very much needs it. I will decorate my great tree.
I shine
That is why I have always called this venture LUMINO which translates from Old Latin to "I shine". It is why I have always said "I hope the things I make for you enable you to do just that."
The night sky during winter over my home