writing – Notes of A Native Son

Stay The Course

It’s been a while since I’ve visited these pages. Had too much going on…or so I was led to believe. What does that even mean? Perhaps I should rephrase the statement and admit that I was distracted. Distracted by all the things that I allowed to get in the way of this pathway. I’ll say this now for emphasis and repeat it later for impact: STAY THE COURSE.

Someone asked me some time ago, “Who is your blog for?” I really didn’t consciously know. I said I just wrote because it was in me to write. I wanted to share experiences that would inspire others…I guess. I really hadn’t thought that deeply about it. I just felt it was something I needed to do. Of course, any question, whether it’s one I appreciate or not, finds its place at the conference table of my mind. Then it came to me. It’s for you.

You, the one taking the time to read these pages. You, the creative spirit manifest in the flesh. At times, as we all do, you will find yourself at a crossroads, not sure which direction is yours. I can go ahead and tell you now, to save you some time and trepidation. And since I know somebody is going to look it up and possibly get distracted, trepidation is basically a feeling of fear or anxiety about something that may happen. But here’s the thing: The right direction is the one you choose. And once you choose to march up to that path, whether it’s sunshine and rainbows or fire and brimstone, walk it like no one has walked it before, because they haven’t. It’s for you. Stay the course.

Take note that I said it’s the one YOU choose. Not the one you settle for. Not the one you’re left with. Not the one somebody else chose for you or you go with out of a sense of obligation. Not even necessarily the one that makes the most sense to everyone watching from the sidelines. It’s the one you choose.

This blog is for the ones who may not have chosen a traditional or easy path. It’s for the ones whose dreams are bigger than their bank accounts. It’s for the ones who have been told their ideas are too big, too strange, too impractical, too late, too early, or too much. It’s for the ones building something nobody else can quite see yet. And maybe most importantly, it’s for the ones who have started down the path and, somewhere along the way, got distracted. That’s where I kept finding myself. Distracted. Not defeated or lost just distracted. There is a difference. Life has a remarkable way of filling our hands with things that demand our attention while quietly stealing our attention from the things that matter most. One opportunity leads to another. One responsibility becomes five. We convince ourselves that we are simply busy when, sometimes, the truth is that we have allowed the important things to be pushed to the side by the urgent things. And before we know it, we’re standing somewhere we never intended to be, wondering how we got there.

That’s when we have to stop. Look around. Remember. Recalibrate. And choose again. Perhaps that’s what this season is for me; choosing again. Returning to the work with pointed intention. Returning to the words. Returning to the ideas that have been knocking on the door of my mind, waiting patiently for me to answer. Returning to the course. The reminders are always there. you hear them; something in a dream, a line in a movie or song, a word from a stranger, or a thought from the ether. You hear it calling. Calling you back to where you left off because the course doesn’t disappear just because you stepped away from it. The dream doesn’t expire because you get distracted. But eventually you will … so let that inspire you. The calling doesn’t vanish because you got tired and the vision doesn’t become less valid because it’s taking longer than you expected.

Sometimes you simply have to find your way back. And when you do, don’t waste time beating yourself up about where you’ve been. Get back in the saddle. Get back on the path. There will be days when you question the destination. There will be days when the path seems too long. There will be days when everybody else appears to be moving past you, according to instagram, facebook, or snapchat. There will be days when the bank account doesn’t line up with the vision. There will be days, more than a few, when the applause is absent. Keep walking, one step at a time, because every season is not about arriving. Some seasons are about becoming. Some seasons are about learning. Some are even about surviving. It’s all about preparing you for what you wanted for before you even knew how much preparation it would require. So if you’re standing at that crossroads right now, take a breath, a minute, a day. Choose your direction. DECIDE. Then move. And if you’ve already chosen your path but you’ve somehow wandered away from it, that’s alright too. Turn around and pick up where you left off. You haven’t missed your entire story because you took a detour. But please don’t confuse a detour with a destination. And don’t allow distraction to become a lifestyle.

STAY THE COURSE. I say it again because sometimes the things we need most are the things we need to hear repeatedly: Stay the course. Stay when it’s hard. Stay when it’s inconvenient. Stay when nobody understands. Stay when the vision seems foolish to everybody but you. Stay when the first version fails. Stay when the second version falters. Learn, adjust, and rebuild. But don’t abandon the path simply because the path became difficult. That’s what makes the distraction the attraction. There is something waiting on the other side of persistence that talent alone cannot reach. And maybe that’s why I’m back here. Not because I have figured it all out. Maybe, I’m back because I’m still figuring it out. And if you’re reading this, maybe you are too. So welcome back. Or perhaps, more appropriately… Welcome forward. The road is still there and the work is still calling. Right now, there is still time to become everything you were created to become. Take the step in front of you. Then take the next one. Don’t worry about seeing the whole road. I’m only asking you to take the next step, one at a time. And whatever you do… Stay the course.

Seeds Planted

Earlier this year, I was in attendance at a local art show. It was a delightful event filled to capacity with an audience eager to interact with art and artists. Usually, I feel a bit of anxiety as I enter these public facing spaces, but that night I had felt none of that. I moved through, eyes wide open in viewing with a calm but expectant inner joy, greeting people I knew and didn’t. At one point a young lady walked up to me and introduced herself with a name just as sublime. She spoke with an air of familiarity. My look must have been a question because she continued to shared that she had been a student of mine in a nearby state. She shared the school. It had been awhile since I’d lived there. I asked what grade was she in as my student. She said third.

It all came back in a gentle flood. I did recall her: small, precocious, bouncy and ever eager to dive into every project. First we went down memory lane with names and personalities and do-you-remembers. I was only at her location for six weeks as I was a traveling artist doing six week residencies in each county school. But apparently an impact had been made. She went on to share that impact to my surprise, wonder, and humbling gratitude. She shared how my being there had impacted her life and even her parents. How they so looked forward to my presence. How I brought with me the art (a resurrecting truth) that activated the seeds of creativity that she has cultivated ever since. She spoke fondly of the art classes but it was my presence, she said, that affirmed her. “To see someone at the school who looked like us and brought what you brought opened up the door of possibilities for me.” We conversed for at least 30 minutes or so as gallery visitors ambled around us. I introduced her to a few fellow artists and colleagues as one of my third grade students from back in the day. Her smile and resolve radiated. This moment in time was art unfolding on itself.

She still does art. Her practice involves the land. Something that is also a cornerstone of my own practice time. We further connected on that. She shared photos of her farm and the art she was creating from her land. I could hear the excitement and enthusiasm in her voice as she shared. Enthusiasm is a sure sign of dedication in purpose. Enthusiasm derives from the Ancient Greek en (in) theos (god) which literally means “to be inspired by a god” or “the god within.” She was living in and on purpose, having been inspired by my early young, and probably clumsy efforts to share what I loved. To me the entire process was the art.

That night gave me two more encounters nearly of the same magnitude, reminding me of the power of being in your element. Living as full as possible in the moments that make up this thing called life. In that space, we become pollinators and nurturers, inspiring and giving others permission to do what they do. In being true to ourselves, we are true to the divine in us and that divine spark sparks life that catches on and spread like the seeds of plants carried by the winds and birds. Some of them will take root and grow. This regeneration is the stuff of which life is made beyond mere survival. Sometimes we get to bear witness to the distant fruit of our labors. Labors that don’t always feel like laboring. Sometimes it’s just us doing what we do because it’s in us to do. It’s a reminder to not hold back or second think living in a purpose on purpose. Time and devotion will make it yours. Again don’t hold back because someone out there needs what you have to offer but sometimes take for granted. What you may see as a moment in time or a simple act may be the seed of a lifetime for someone else.

This Too…

Outside the window of my writing desk, across the field in the distance, sits a standing grove of trees. Not long ago it was beautifully surrounded by a sloping grassy hill rolling down into a field that stretched out bearing alternate crops of corn and soybeans. Now the grove sits alone, the field practically leveled. Exposed compacted red clay lays ready for more concrete and asphalt of the impending neighborhood being constructed. For years I’ve enjoyed looking out across that field. Even hiking up to the sacred feeling space sometimes. Sometimes the dog was with me. Sometimes it was just me. But curiously, it never felt like just me.

Once everything was cleared, the grove of trees was left standing. I wondered why. Uncle Joe, the family’s approaching centenarian and patriarch of this land said there was a graveyard up there. At least it was when he was a boy. I found it interesting because as many times as I’d been up on that hill, I never saw a graveyard. He said it was there but had never seen any burials there in his life time. We are talking about nearly an entire century here. Spurred on by my curiosity, I set out to explore the grove again minus the beautiful rising slope of thick grass on which we had fantasized of building our house. The area was cordoned off with an orange netted fence that both the dog and I easily hopped over. Finally on the northwest side, in the thick of the grove, I saw the first tombstone. It stretched out prone among the trees, lying there like a sleeping behemoth. There there were others. Some in pristine condition, others cracked and being swallowed up by earth but present as a reminder of lives once lived.

I could make out a name or two. Wondered who they were. Where had they lived? What did they do? Had they left some mark that impacted the now? Who were their descendants? All I could physically see were stones. The cold hard monuments stood in contrast to the warmth of lives once lived. What had been their concerns, their worries, their fears, or challenges. None of that mattered to them now. As I stood there, mortality tapped upon my intellect and took me forward a hundred years or so and there it was; someone looking upon the markers of those of us present now and asking some of those same questions.

Suddenly I had a shift in perspective. This too shall pass has become a common bumper sticker proverb. However, its profundity is no less relevant. What are we doing with the time we’ve been granted her on this plain? Are we using precious energy and limited time on things that won’t matter in the long run..or short? How much time do we waste on worry and fretting; time that could be invested in living while we yet live? All of those material things that we slave for and give life to will belong to someone else in a hundred years or so. We will be just a memory. Where are you planting those seeds that will continue to birth the power of your living beyond your lifetime? What legacy are you building by living in all the corners of this thing call life?

One day soon. That grove of trees will be surrounded by the voices of children playing, crying laughing, heading to and from school. It will be surrounded by people making love, more children, marrying, divorcing, working, and buying. Some could even call it living the American dream and then… that too shall pass. All we have is the now. It belongs to us in the present. Let us go all out and do what we can and will with want we have with the most precious gift of all because one day, we’ll have to give it all back.

InterPlanetary

Last week, during one of our morning family fireside chats, I asked the question, What’s a fond memory from your childhood? My youngest daughter chimed in first. She recalled a time when she was much younger and wasn’t feeling well. She was sad about something. I asked her the type of question only a parent who still believes in magic might ask…

“Do you want to leave this planet?”

She said yes, so I proceeded tolifted her up, turned her upside down, planted her little feet on the ceiling, and walked her across, one step at a time. When I asked if she was ready to return to Earth, she said yes again and just like that, she felt better. The truth is, I didn’t remember that specific incident at all. But I do know that I’ve walked every one of my children, nieces, and nephews across some available ceiling at one time or another. Kitchen ceilings. Living room ceilings. Hallway ceilings. Bedroom ceilings. Wherever gravity could be temporarily renegotiated.

That parent-child exchange wasn’t merely about play alone. It was about perspective. Dr. Wayne Dyer use to say, “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at, change.” More often than not, that change makes the change. Sometimes the world feels unbearable not because it is, but because we’re seeing it from the same angle over and over again. Same floor. Same ceiling. Same weight. Same worries pressing down. A small shift, just enough to invert the view, can remind us that what feels permanent might only be positional. When you’re upside down, the rules change. The ceiling becomes a road. The weight in your chest loosens. You’re no longer stuck, you’re traveling. That’s what my daughter remembered. Not sickness. Not sadness but motion, care, imagination at work, and much needed relief.

Perhaps that’s the quiet calling of this season. We’re living in a time when many people are carrying more than they can articulate. Grief without language. Fear without clear edges. Responsibilities stacked so high they feel endless. Some are so weighed down they’re not just asking to leave the planet, they are checking out in not so good ways. Ways that can be avoided if we dare to care beyond a thought.

What if our task right now isn’t to fix everything? What if it’s simply to help one another change altitude? To lift someone gently. To offer a momentary escape, not necessarily from reality, but from its heaviness. To say, “Let me help you with this for a second. Let me show you another way to see it.” You don’t need rockets for that. Just presence, care, and the willingness to look a little silly while carrying someone upside down through a hard moment. A change in perspective doesn’t erase pain but it can loosen its grip. Sometimes, that’s enough to help someone feel better. It can be just enough to help them return to Earth a little more ready to move forward. That’s interplanetary work; real space travel that acknowledges the space between us as connection. No doubt, we could all use a little more of that right now.

Esperanza

It was 2014, on the eve of my hearing of the passing of the legendary luminary Maya Angelou that I penned these words held buoyant by hers, “Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, I am the dream and the hope of the slave.” For the last few weeks I’d walked in the challenge of addressing, through art, the theme of violence in Colombia. Colombia was enslaved by a history of violence that continues to taint its present color in the eyes of the rest of the world. In my time there, from speaking on the panel with the mayor of Medellin downtown at the Mayo por la Vida Celebration, to walking the neighborhood streets of rural Apartado with school age children; I saw the power of the very thing that Maya Angelou talked about-hope. Hope, not the one that sits and reaches out to nothing and just waits. No. Hope, that unsinkable mindset that hovered above me night after night as I pondered the depth of the question asked of me many times during my sojourn there, “Do you really believe in world peace?” Each time, the question hit me like a dark wave threatening to drown the belief in change to which I clung ever so tightly.

One evening I had the honor of visiting a three year old girl who had been shot just days before. As I knelt down beside her, without hesitation or concern she reached out and put her tiny arms around my neck and gave me a hug that could have embraced the world. In her sunshine smile and angelic eyes I saw what I needed to see, my answer, the reason I was doing what I was doing. I saw hope in its purest form shining onto my faith and casting away any shadow of doubt that may have been lurking in my mind. Not the type of hope that sits waiting, internally pleading for something to change, but the kind that continually rises up in the face of all that would suppress us. The Spanish word for hope is esperanza. That little crippled girl awakened in me a renewed sense of hope. Esperanza was echoed in the face of every child and Colombian I saw from that point onward. I always reminded myself that there’s always a way.

I am an artist, and art is my weapon of choice for peace and justice. What I mean by justice is that which I want for myself, I also want for others. I bring, like Maya Angelou said, the gifts the ancestors gave and I use them for the enriching of this planet we are blessed to inhabit. Although I was a speaker of English in a Spanish speaking country, art is a universal language, and her most vivid color is love. I was met with the spirit I came with. I walk with art as agency for change. Change is coming. Not only do I believe it, I know it because I saw the preview of a new world reflected in the eyes of the children who looked into mine. And in their smiles and attitudes I saw the blueprints. That isn’t political or scientific, or any other form of measurable statistic. It’s the power of esperanza. Where there is life, esperanza (hope) lives, and where she lives, change is inevitable. Hold on.

Hills of Dreams: Becoming What We Needed to See

Sometimes the universe whispers before it speaks.

Not long ago, I had the idea that I wanted to do something for the elementary school I attended as a child. I considered doing a mural or workshop. It was an idea that I mentioned only to my wife and scribbled in my journal. The very next week, no joke, I opened an email from the art teacher at Rolling Hills Elementary School. Her enthusiasm came straight up outta that computer. She had seen my work and wanted me to paint a mural. She had the will and the zeal, but no true idea what it would take or cost to bring it to pass. But I already knew it was destined to be. We trusted the process. Huntsville City Schools and local sponsors answered the call and the project was set in motion. We would call the mural, Hills of Dreams.

With mixed feelings I returned to those linoleum floored cinderblock halls where my own journey began. Rolling Hills Elementary School was where I first discovered the joy of art making as a thing, the exhilaration of diving deep into the creative process, seeing my work on the walls for the very first time. Where I walked with reverence into that precious carpeted library that served as a keyhole to the worlds of my interests. Where I watched a popcorn seed planted in a baby food jar sitting in the window, sprout and reach for the sun. Where at the end of my fourth grade year, the teacher gave me my pick of books on the shelf by her desk. I felt like I bit off a little piece of heaven that day. At that little cozy elementary school tucked into northwest Huntsville, nestled on a hilltop, the foundation who I am as a creative was laid. To create there again, among students and teachers, was more than full circle. It was cosmic alignment.

One day, while I worked on the mural in the cafeteria, a group of students came in to watch a film. Out of curiosity, I glanced back at the screen then noticed a boy with his face toward me. He wasn’t watching the movie at all. His eyes were fixed on me as I painted. I could feel him watching. Deep, steady, unblinking. I turned back to my work, brushed paint onto the wall, and later looked again. He was still watching. Still locked in. Of course it didn’t bother me at all. People always ask whether it distracts me when they watch or talk to me when I am painting murals. The answer is no because I see mural painting as a type of performance art. Interaction with the audience is an integral part of the work.

In that moment, I wondered What was that little fella thinking? Was he seeing himself in me? Was I looking back at me at that age? I thought about how vital it is to live fully in my space, to be visibly present on my wings. Because oh, what it would have meant for me to have seen that when I was his age. To see possibility embodied, to see someone creating, to see myself reflected in real time. That’s what doing what I do is about. It isn’t just putting paint on walls or pen to paper. It’s about planting visions. It’s about representing and recreating for inspiration. It’s about adopting the responsibility to be what I once needed to see.

Every child deserves a light to reach toward. Adults can use it as well. So what do you say we commit or recommit to standing tall in our space, to showing up fully, to inspiring boldly for the ones watching us with wide eyes, waiting for their own wings to sprout. Because Hills of Dreams is not just my slinging paint on a lunchroom wall. It’s an embodiment, an incubator for what belongs to every child or person with a dream bigger than their circumstances. It’s for all of us who dare to go for the dream and to forge trails for others to follow. In fact , as I consider it all, I think I’ve been dreaming too small.

Reflection

I was recently painting a mural at an elementary school when the most inspiring thing happened. Not that inspiration isn’t flowing freely in an elementary school anyway. It was one of the last few days of the school year and energy was over the top. And boy do I remember those days. Plus it was a delayed day because of a previous night storm. A small group of teachers gathered in the Lunchroom for movie time for the children. Kindergarten through third grade piled in and planted themselves on the round stools at the tables, their attention supposedly glued to the big screen. Every so often, I’d pause from the strokes of my brush amid giggles and squeals, and glance back at the group and the show they were watching. Each time, I noticed one particular little fella—not watching the movie like the others—but watching me with intensity. Quiet. Still. Eyes locked in on my process.

He didn’t seem restless or antsy but focused. It wasn’t like he was distracted from the movie. I don’t think he had even started watching it. He was drawn—not to noise or the movie screen, but to the motion of my brush, the forming of images, The colors spreading on the wall, the unfolding progress of creation. To me, it was doing the thing I do. But to him it appeared to me magnetic. I couldn’t help but wonder what was going through his little head. Maybe he was in awe, mesmerized by this art thing. Maybe he saw himself. Maybe he recognized something familiar in the rhythm of the interplay of mind, spirit, passion, and whatever else makes us do what we do when we do it well. Maybe he thought I looked funny. But more than anything, what I realized is this: that used to be me, often silent but fiercely observant. Sometimes, the quietest gaze holds the loudest affirmation.

As a boy, I was captivated by the act of making, how things came to be. The why, who, when, where of the what. It drew me like a plant pulled toward the sunlight. I didn’t always have the language for it, but I knew I knew. There was something calling, beckoning. And now, all these years later, I find myself on the other side of that moment, being watched by a child whose heart might be whispering the same call. It reminded me that the work we do—especially the work born from intention, from purpose, from struggle and joy—echoes from the depths of life to the surface. It creates ripples. It becomes a mirror, a map, or a magnet for someone else.

That’s why it is imperative that we keep showing up. Not just for ourselves, but for the ones quietly watching, absorbing, being shaped by the vision of what’s possible. We are giving permission to the next artist. The next teacher. The next leader. The next dreamer. The next builder of worlds. What matters most doesn’t just leave a mark on walls, paper, stage, or film, —it leaves a reflection for and in those to come.

_{Photo by Michelle McClintock}

It Is What It Is

There’s something about standing in the cool shadow of death that reminds us to live. Not just to exist. Not just to breathe. But to live.

Recently, my aunt passed on. I stood beside her as we talked possibly more than we had ever talked before. At least one on one like that. Other times we had always been surrounded by other family members as we exchanged a few words here and there. In that still room, a holy hush wrapped itself around us. I looked down at her—and I saw her. Not as I had always seen her—but as she truly was. Her full lips. Her smooth, unlined skin. Her deep, brown eyes, wide listening. It felt like I was seeing her for the first time. I saw her almost perfect hands were manicured with no polish, barely warm as they wrapped around mine. I heard my Dad’s words come out of my mouth, “I want to pray with you.” When I finished, she continued in a whisper barely audible. Then she smiled.

She was not an old woman. Not by our measure. But here she was resting in that portal, that liminal space between breath and spirit, between what was and what will be. She spoke in whispers, each word labored, each syllable soaked in meaning. Then came the moment that now echoes in my soul. She took a deep breath—one of her last for the week—and as it left her lungs, it came forth with
“It is what it is.” At first, I thought it was just a form of resignation. It felt like so much more though. It was revelation. For me, one who values spiritual connection and ancestral knowing, that phrase carries weight. It isn’t about giving up. It’s about giving in—to divine order, to ancestral timing, to the eternal rhythm of life, death, and rebirth. “It is what it is” is not a shrug. It’s a knowing. It’s a surrender that comes with dignity. It’s the utterance of one who has come face to face with the edge of this world and has decided to speak peace to it.

In our communities, we often mask our pain with strength, with a fake stoicism. But there’s something radical about embracing what is. It is an act of spiritual resistance. A return to the old ways of being in relationship with the mystery. To look death in the eye, and still bless the moment with your breath! That is power. That is ancestral poise.

To her two sons—my cousins, no longer the little boys I remember running around—I want to say this: Your mother loved you with an undying love. She saw you. She knew you were and as you are. It’s is in your hands now to take that to the next level and be the best seeds she ever planted. make good on her investment. She carried you, not just in her womb but in her spirit. She watched over you with quiet strength — and she could let loose with some fire to get you in gear. We know she didn’t play. None of us are angelic all the time. Some of her final words to my ears, “It is what it is,” were not meant to harden or dismiss—but to hold us. She was teaching her final lesson. That life cannot always be understood, but it must always be honored. That even in the transition, there is truth and knowing that goes forever forward. That we don’t have to make sense of everything to be at peace with it. Let those words become your shield. Let them remind you that what goes away has not vanished, only changed form. That smile, that laugh of hers is still with us. Your mother is an ancestor now, an ascendant. She is not silent. She is speaking still, through memory, through love, through you.

To those who have loved and feel the loss—You are not alone. Our people have been burying loved ones for generations, and still we rise. Still we sing. Still we embrace and smile at each other at funerals, calling joy out of sorrow. The dull ache of grief may never leave you. But neither will the love. Love never dies. Stand up straight in the cool shadow of death—and allow it to remind you to live. To laugh. To cry. To say “it is what it is,” not with defeat in your heart, but with reverence on your lips. Those words to me, in that moment from my aunt, were a benediction. A battle cry. A blessing.

More Than a Portrait

It was more than an honor to play a part in the resurrection of Jefferson Davis Jackson’s image and legacy. From the very first mention of this project, I sensed it was more than an artistic endeavor — it was a cosmic assignment, a sacred agreement between the seen and unseen, calling forth the spirit of a great man long buried beneath the weight of history’s silence. For 66 years beginning in the late 1800s, Jefferson Davis Jackson worked on the University of Alabama campus beginning at the tender age of 11 years old. Many of those years he labored alongside Dr. Eugene A. Smith, a professor and geologist invested in finding the natural resources that could be used to develop industry in the state following the ravages of the civil war. Jefferson Davis Jackson, a man devoted to life, wore many hats on campus and abroad. From custodial, to maintenance, to traveling by horse and buggy with Dr. Smith across the entirety of Alabama excavating and documenting the natural resources and history of the state. From home to church, to work, he was all in. He worked in the very building, Smith Hall, where Autherine Lucy, the University of Alabama’s first Black student took classes. Was he there the day a shotgun blast blew a permanent scar to the outside of Smith Hall, or the day an Alabama governor made a diabolical declaration. Somewhere along the way the name and legacy of J. D. Jackson were covered over by time, ignorance, and the order of the day.

One day I received an email from a young woman working in the Museum of Natural science at the University of Alabama. It’s Alabama’s oldest natural science museum. I could feel the excitement through her appeal. She had found a trail leading to the greatness of a Black man Named Jefferson Davis Jackson. She wanted me to do a red clay portrait of him. “I knew I had to contact you.” she said. “I knew you were the only one who could do this justice.” Soon we spoke by phone and, feeling the tug of ancestral beckoning through my busy schedule, I agreed to do the portrait. I needed to walk the areas he walked, see the spaces he inhabited, speak to relatives, and gather earth from his walked pathways. Why did he start working at the university at age 11? How did he lose his eye? We scheduled a trip to Tuscaloosa and the journey began.

The process itself is ritual. I gathered red clay from the very soil of the campus of the University of Alabama. This time under the click of cameras and the gaze of assistants. The sacred ground is alive with memory, connecting my work to the land and its complex, often untold, narratives. The red clay, stained with the life-blood of our ancestors, holds within it both trauma and triumph — the iron-rich soil echoing the iron in human blood, linking us inextricably to those who came before. In its crimson grains, I feel the pulse of generations. Mother Earth knows their names. The clay is a portal, a living map. To this I added water from the nearby Warrior River. Water represents spirit. The river is a witness, a keeper of stories, a carrier of forgotten songs. Its waters hold the essence of what was lost and what still lingers. As clay and water met paper, each touch was more than technique. It was an invocation. The act of placing clay upon the surface became a merging of worlds, a thin place where past, present, and future blurred. I never work alone. Sometimes I feel like the ancestors are leaning in, guiding my hands, speaking through the vibration of the red earth. In this work Jefferson Davis Jackson was not just being rendered, but reawakened, his light called forth through the elements of earth and water, through the breath of spirit and artistic calling.

The portrait is a vessel — a bridge between dust and flesh, blood and starlight, past and future. The red clay tethers this work to this southern landscape and to the heavens. It affirms what we already know deep in our bones: that our stories cannot be erased. They may sleep beneath the soil, but they rise again through us, with us radiant and undeniable. In this artwork, Jackson stands not as a rendering or shadow of the past but as a resurrected star in the firmament of Black excellence, human nobility, a beacon for those yet to come. From his devotion to the university and his community to his baritone voice in the church choir, he was a man among men. This is not simply a painting—it is a ceremony. A cosmic reckoning. A testimony inscribed in earth and water, blood and memory. It is a conjuring, a return, a restoration. With hands deep in sacred soil, I summon legacy back into the light, returning one of our own to his rightful place among the honored. Let this work stand not only as tribute but as threshold. A portal. A vow. To this end—and this radiant beginning—there is more to come…

In Search of Okay

This morning, as I lay in bed far past usual, with the sunlight spilling into the room, my mind circled around a familiar yet complicated idea of being okay. What does it really mean to be okay, to be alright? Not in the way we toss it around in passing conversations, but in the quiet, honest places within ourselves. On the path I’ve chosen — this project-based, often unpredictable existence as an artist, I find myself constantly moving between points — this project, that commission, this opportunity, that possibility. And in every moment, I realize I’m often searching for a position where I can quietly say to myself, I’m okay. Not necessarily victorious. Not defeated. Just okay. Okay with where I am, or where I thought I’d be by now. It’s a constant negotiation between expectation and acceptance.

When we meet people, we ask how they’re doing. “I’m okay.” “I’m alright.” Simple words that cover so much. Sometimes they’re true. Sometimes they’re placeholders. And sometimes, they’re shields we use to keep the deeper, heavier parts at bay. Lately, I’ve started to wonder — what do I mean when I say I want to be okay? Is it peace? Is it progress? Is it simply a quiet wrinkle in time where everything doesn’t feel like it’s pressing in? Am I hoping for a point in my life, or my work, where I can be completely alright with what is? And if so… does that place even exist, or are we forever chasing it, catching only glimpses as it moves just out of our reach?

I’m learning that maybe okay isn’t a permanent destination. Maybe it’s a fleeting pause — a breath — a fragile alignment between what’s happening around me and what’s happening within me. It’s the moment I stop measuring, stop chasing, and simply allow myself to be. Today, I’m in search of an okay that may not be a finish line or a reward, but a quiet, honest moment where I can say to myself, I’m alright… as I am, right here, right now. And maybe for today, that’s enough. So if you find yourself searching too, know that sometimes, okay isn’t a place you arrive at — it’s a moment you allow.