Mother’s Day at Meishlish

The Chickadee in a Farm Frame

Around here Meishlish celebrates Mother’s Day hard, and not just because the creator might be a bit of a momma’s boy.

 In 2018 I completed my first map art using alcohol markers. Made as a housewarming gift depicting my friend's cat, I had no idea what I was doing, but even from the start I loved the concept and the way the translucent alcohol markers looked on the map page. My brother had seen me working on the gift and told me how much he liked what I was doing, so I followed up the cat by drawing a ewe for him. He runs a sheep ranch after all.

Note: For me personally, when I got started doing my map art it really helped having someone in mind while working on a project. It kept me on task, I found I did better/more careful work, and most importantly- I actually finished. I think most creative people will relate to the millions of half-finished projects laying around in their mind and art space not necessarily because they are bad or half-baked, but because making art for yourself can feel self-indulgent or unimportant.

I was really loving this map journey I had started, and had some other ideas I wanted to do on maps, but I was still under the impression I was only allowed to do ‘big’ or ‘real’ art if I had someone to give it to. Enter Mother’s Day 2019. Now I know everyone’s relationship with their mother is different, but I am lucky enough to have a mom who claims to think I’m great, even when I’m not. While the cat drawing depicted my friend’s pet, and the ewe was one from my brother’s ranch, - my mother would be someone I could make something I was passionate about and she wouldn’t hold it over my head. As horrible as that is to admit, I knew I could take some risks or fall on my face and she would be excited about the finished product if it a success or a failure. So, using a literal map scrap depicting the northeastern United States, (a place my mother has no ties to) I actually chose that particular map because it was so beat up I wasn’t scared to ruin it.

Note: At the start of my map journey, I was PETRIFIED to work on my grandmother’s old vintage maps because I was sure I would ruin them. Not to mention drawing on them felt like vandalism. This fear has thankfully gone away with time, but in the beginning, I used to literally get sweaty palms and shaky hands making the first mark on the map I would never be able to come back from.

Map scrap in hand, and no inhibitions about what my final audience I was gifting it to might think of it, I drew a chickadee with floating berry branches. I am a bird lover, and I chose the chickadee not because it has a connection to my mother, but because it’s my favorite bird. No bigger than a golf ball, always traveling in packs, and one of the only birds to not abandon us in winter, I truly feel happy every time I spot one. It also helps their name is so fun to say.

With the gift finished, I gave it to my mother as planned, and as expected - she loved it. To this day the chickadee sits on my mother’s mantel and it is one of my favorite map drawings I have completed. I have since gotten over the ‘must make art for others’ mindset and have gone on to make many more personal pieces, but this one was special because in a lot of ways, it was the first map I completed for me. I am so thankful to my mom who created an environment for me growing up where I could feel comfortable making mistakes and taking risks. My mother has always been as happy that I'm pleased with a finished project as the product itself, and that has always given me the courage to swing for the fences. Win or lose, she'll stand in my corner. And it's not lost on me that the chickadee may be a ‘win’ only because I had that mindset going in. 

But that's not the only reason Mother’s Day is celebrated at Meishlish- oh no. Mother’s Day weekend also marks the very first market where I pedaled my art wares. That’s right, it has been one whole year since my VERY first market where I sold my art for the VERY first time. Was it maybe the most scary and intimidating day of my life? (I want to be dramatic and say ‘yes,’ but the time I rolled a vehicle on a canyon road in Moab also comes to mind, -- so I guess we’ll just have to put it in the top five.) Standing behind a table full of my own artwork the imposter syndrome was so overwhelming my knees actually shook. Thankfully, it didn’t go too badly... and guess what?— the very first art I ever sold was a print of that Mother’s Day chickadee. True story.

So happy Mother’s Day everyone, and a huge thank you to my mother, sisters, grandmothers, and all other mother figures I’ve had in my life. Meishlish flat-out does not exist without them.  

Me and Mom