Breaking the Blocks
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Thanks for stopping by! Life is tough, and I think this podcast might offer you some relief. My aim? To inspire you to overcome some of your own blocks through the inspirational, honest, and at times, downright raw conversations with some wonderful guests, not huge celebrities, regular people like you and I. Let’s see how they have overcome the difficulties in their lives and offer you some advice and more importantly hope.
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Breaking the Blocks
Healing our Life: Carl Brown on Coping with Grief
When the threads of life unravel, where do we find the strength to sew them back together? I, Rachel Pierman, along with former cancer nurse and fiber artist Carl Brown, unravel the complexities entwined in loss, healing, and the therapeutic embrace of creativity. In a candid conversation, we stitch together the silent power of presence in grief, the sanctuary found in the rhythm of needle and thread, and the unexpected joy that creativity can usher into a life shadowed by sorrow.
The raw edges of our souls often mirror the chaotic underside of a quilt; both conceal stories that are felt more than seen. My own journey through the agony of my father's passing finds its echo in Carl's transition from the rigors of healthcare to the solace of quilting. Together, we share insights on navigating the intricate patterns of grief and discover how the act of creating can serve as a gentle balm, offering through the colors and contours of fabric what words sometimes cannot. The beauty lies not only in the art we produce but also in the ways we give back and grow. Carl and I explore the rich fulfilment that comes from teaching, the importance of setting healthy boundaries, and the aspirations that drive us forward into the realms of fiber art. Listeners are invited to wrap themselves in the warmth of our stories, reminded that within the stitches of our shared humanity, we find connection, purpose, and the courage to begin anew.
Well, hello, lovely listener, welcome back to another episode of Breaking the Blocks. I'm your host, rachel Pierman. One of the things that I think that we all do as human beings is to walk around in our lives and look at other people and assume that their lives are better than ours, that they don't have the same stresses that we have. Maybe they're all in really good relationships or they have a great circle of friends, or maybe their finances are sorted out, or perhaps they're not going through any kind of grief or heartbreak or loss or anything else like we're going through, and that, I think, is the biggest mistruth that we tell ourselves. And when I was chatting to Carl Brown for this episode, a fiber artist who also went through a very tragic experience in his life, the one thing I realized is that we all have these struggles that we cover, because I had no idea that Carl had been through the experiences that he had. What was lovely about this chat with Carl and I was that we talked about how we can overcome a traumatic experience, how we can overcome these blocks, particularly with creativity, but how we can help other people when they are struggling with grief. When they come to you and they need support. What do you say in those times? What can you offer? The answer, surprisingly, was silence. Well, this conversation was far from quiet, so I hope you'll sit back and relax and perhaps take on board some of the things that carl has said and learn some lessons about what to do the next time someone comes to you for some help and support.
Speaker 1:Well, it is lovely to have you in the Breaking the Block studio, carl, and I have to say we are matching perfectly. For anybody who is just listening to this, they'll think what. Well, we're both wearing greens. You've got that most amazing quilt behind you, one of your pieces, an explosion of colour, which is how I see you in your work. You are just an explosion of colour in every way Joy, abundance. I think it's all kind of happening for you at the moment, isn't it, carl? But we will come to all of that. We'll come to all of that. You haven't always been a quilter. You are now becoming a full-time fibre artist. But what were you before you started quilting as a kind of a main thing to do in your life?
Speaker 2:I am. I guess I still consider myself to be a cancer nurse and I have done that work for about 35 years, 30, 35 years, so you can do the math on my age. But I was thinking I had. I had my father's sister at the age of 21 or 22, had a very unusual cancer and she had two kids that were one was a year older than me and one was a year younger, and I just remember, of course, unfortunately this was in the 70s and she had died of cancer and I just remembered how it upset our family so much to have someone so young go missing from my grandmother, from my cousins, and probably for the rest of my life I always thought about being a nurse.
Speaker 2:I just really was interested in it because, you know, I kind of grew up in Indiana, in the middle of the country, and my family didn't have a lot of money to send me, send us to college. So I joined the military and I became a dental assistant first and a dental hygienist first, and then I decided, wow, I really like working with patients, but maybe not only in their mouth, and so I then went on, went nursing school. While I was in nursing school I worked on a bone marrow transplant unit, spent 20 years in the military as a nurse, and at the end of those 20 years I decided to go back to school and get a PhD and that qualified me to be able to do cancer research, nursing research. I have textbooks you can look me up on Google all about how to care for symptoms, and so, yeah, I've dedicated 30 plus years to working with families and people with cancer and really, really just loved the career.
Speaker 2:And sometimes I even miss being with patients working on the newest medications, because all of the treatment for cancer has changed so much over the last 30 years. So I miss that a little bit. And the patients that I've cared for there must be thousands of them. That the patients that I've cared for there must be thousands of them that, interestingly, when I'm quilting, they seem to make their way into my mind like in a memory. So I think about this patient or that patient, certainly not just when I'm quilting just in everyday life.
Speaker 1:So I've had a really full life working in cancer and really loved it. I think it's amazing, though, though, when I meet people like you, carl, because I look at what I've done and I just look at you and I think, wow, okay, so first of all dental nurse, and then you progress to cancer nursing, and then you're doing extra educational things and learning and getting extra degrees and this, that and the other. I mean it's quite, it's amazing what you've actually been doing for 30 years. Do you look back at that 30 years and think, wow, I made a difference in quite a lot of people's lives there. I'm very proud of what I've done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think I feel like it is a service to humanity to do that, and people all the time are like, oh, that must be so depressing or that must be such a hard job. And I think there are just some of us that have callings to different jobs and, like I would never want to work with pediatric, with children, because I would probably stand there and cry, it would be so sad. And there are these really great nurses and doctors and health care providers who just have that knack, and so it's really great to find health care providers, for example, that are able to find what it is that some people like to work geriatrics or some like to work mental health. And so I do feel like I've kind of given my part to humanity and I think it's now time for younger nurses, doctors, health care providers to come forward and pick up the wand and move forward with it. While I work on fiber art.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean you said there that when you're quilting, these people pop into your minds. Yeah, I mean you said there that when you're quilting, these people pop into your minds. Do you think that your work is ever influenced by any of the people that you've met? Because it's really interesting, carl, I knew you were a cancer nurse and I know your work and I hadn't put the two together until you've just described your profession. And now I mean I think we all read things into things.
Speaker 1:But now I'm kind of looking at your quilts and I'm seeing quite frenetic movement. It's almost like it could be. I'm kind of I'm just going to say what I'm seeing. So I'm kind of seeing, okay, maybe atoms, and then maybe I'm seeing drama in there, maybe I'm seeing anger in there, maybe I'm seeing grief, I don't know. I'm just it's the explosion of shape and color that you use, that when, obviously, we have cancer, we go through all of these different feelings and emotions and they are explosive because they impact us hugely. So I'm just wondering actually if there's any connection between your quilting and your previous life.
Speaker 2:I don't know. Sometimes I have thought about it. I mean, it's obvious to everybody that looks at my work and I've only been doing work for five years but oh, I just don't do anything. That is not of color. It just doesn't work for me. Now, sometimes, as I've learned with studying with Nancy Crowe and this, use of grays or flats, but I only use those to lay bright colors next to them to more accentuate the brights.
Speaker 2:You know, at QuiltCon this year there was a lot of focus on gun violence and you know, have I ever thought about for some of the grief that I've had that maybe we'll talk about that, putting that into some kind of quilt, and I just don't see it that way.
Speaker 2:And my friend and colleague, irene Roderick, says you know, I don't quilt anything. That's sad, that has maybe some kind of social meaning. I want to stay on the happier side of things and I don't think that means that it doesn't come out in the quilting that you're doing. I guess I'm trying to settle my life with brightness and happiness and because I have worked with a lot of people who have died, who went through illness, whose family experienced cancer, and so maybe I'm patchworking, if you will, in a way a lot of color and a lot of brightness to maybe cover over that and try to make the world a little bit brighter. So I guess the answer is yes. I probably I don't actively think about oh I'm doing this work as a way to deal with, but subconsciously I'm sure for all artists, everybody, that it kind of does work its way out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's interesting because I was talking to Russell Barrett in the recent podcast that was out. He surprised me actually because he said when I look at my work, I see a sadness underlying it, which really surprised me because I said how can that be? Because you have these dancing shirts and color. And he said I think I'm trying to cover my inner sadness by being so joyful in the quilts. So in a way, that's interesting that you just picked up on that for yourself, that you are just wanting to now focus on joy and happiness and happiness Maybe. How precious life is. Life is joyful and full of color, because you've seen that so often lives are taken away.
Speaker 2:I was thinking about that this weekend when I saw all these people at QuiltCon on Instagram and all these people were living in joy and they were living in happiness. But in my experience of 30 years of grief counseling, in my own personal experience, I know that everyone is fighting a battle of some sort. Almost all of us are battling something that's bothering us, whether it's depression, anxiety, loss of a dog, an ill dog, loss of a child, loss of money, loss of career or things that are much more serious, like a cancer diagnosis or the death of a loved one. And you know, in all of my work, it was always amazing to me that you would talk with these people personally and you would know what they were experiencing. But then you would meet them at the elevator and press the elevator button and they all looked like they were in complete control of their life. But it's only by being able to look through the window of their life and you know what's going on with them.
Speaker 2:It's really interesting that human beings are able to pull it all together, you know. So it also reminds me it just popped in my mind of a quilt, and the front of it is beautiful, right, and the back of it that you've put together. It can be very frantic, it can be. There are threads everywhere, there are seams everywhere, especially for my work. That backing gets put into a quilt that will never be seen again because it will be quilted.
Speaker 2:And I think that's a lot about the insides of people sometimes is this things are really frantic but on the surface, on the front of a quilt, it looks like we're holding it, that we're, you know, holding it all together. And so anyway, leading back to QuiltCon, it was wow I you know knowing that many of the people there that were dealing with personal things in their life, but there was this sense of joy. People were happy, they were with their friends, they were seeing each other's quilts. You know, I think people are really dealing with a lot of things and I think quilting helps to bring some of that out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I absolutely agree with you. I love that that you've just said about that. The quilt and the bag that's so brilliant. That's so brilliant. I mean I've got an analogy which is very different to that. But sometimes we're like swans, so on the top you see us just gliding through our lives and underneath our feet are peddling like crazy to get us through the water. So it's a similar thing. But I absolutely love that analogy you gave there with the quilt and the backing.
Speaker 2:Once you begin to quilt that it is forever locked. Whatever is stuck in there is going to, and I think that's so much like like people, I think.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, yeah. We walk through our lives and we carry these battle scars, don't we? And although we learn to live with them, the scar is always there and if you touch it it's a little bit tingly.
Speaker 2:You know this is probably a good lead in in that, you know, for years and years I helped people with their grief, through their cancer, and you know, as I've shared with you, about 15 years ago my father was murdered and wow that, you know that really just put a hole in me and you know I just thought about you know, you always see people that are like on the news at night and somebody's murdered or they're looking into a murder and you always just think that it will never be you, and so I became one of those people that's walking around, you know, and here I'd been trying to help all of these other people and now I was one of those people myself that was dealing with this, this huge loss.
Speaker 2:I think they say that most murders are done from people that that other, that person that was murdered, knows. So you know, we eventually found out who that person was and you know, for several years it was trying to get that person to jail and trying to find ways to make good for what had happened to my father of grief that I went through and even today, even now, 15 years later, I still have really good days and really bad days and I'm one of those people that pushes the elevator button and there are a lot of other people around and I make it all look like I've. Well, I hope you know I try to look like I've got it all together, but it's a really strange or interesting story that I had done all of this work all of these years in that, never thinking that I would ever be one of those people that would need grief, counseling, that would need to work through it, and I became one of those people. I mean, you just happened to mention this.
Speaker 1:You know when you said we're going to do the podcast, and then you said you know. When you said we're going to do the podcast, and then you said you know one thing you won't know about me is that my father was murdered. And it's such a shocking thing word I mean, I had no idea, I would never have guessed you know from you, as you say, I would have just thought you'd had this lovely life, and you know that must have been, I mean, the shock. How did you find out? When you know? Were you told? Was it police turning up or was it what happened?
Speaker 2:Well, we were not living in the same state and they I don't think that they knew how to reach out to me, but they knew. This is really interesting. I was the national president of the Oncology Nursing Society, so 32,000 member. I was the president of it for two years traveled the world talking about cancer I think they were a violence advocate, so someone who my father had been killed the day before and they Googled my name. Then they called the Oncology Nursing Society because that's what popped up first. And then someone from the Oncology Nursing Society said the police are trying to reach out to you. And then I called them and you know it was the. Are you the son of Mr Brown? And I said yes, and then they said we're, you know, we're very sorry, he was murdered.
Speaker 2:And I just, I, just, I don't really remember a lot after that. I was just in complete and utter shock and it was just a very odd time and it was very, very difficult for both me and my family, and even parts of it you don't even remember. And then you finally work yourself into a system where you start you know of course you want to, into a system where you start you know of course you want to. You know who did this and you know trying to find all of that and then trying to move on with life and the effect of it, for you know both myself and my family as well.
Speaker 1:And was the person eventually caught and put into prison?
Speaker 2:No is the answer to that. So in Florida there is a stand your ground law, and stand your ground law basically means that if you say that somebody did something to you and that you were protecting yourself, then that person would not um, would not have to go, would not have to go to jail. So unfortunately, the person that did that um to my father did not ever spend any time in jail for the murder of my father, spent a lot of time in prison for other things because there was drugs related and stuff like that. So that was always a bit of the sad, sad part of it as well. It's like the second wave of things that you always have to think about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so how did you come to terms with all of that then? How did you, how did you go through that process? Because, as you say, there are so many different processes to go through. There I mean shock, anger. You want retribution. Does forgiveness come into it somewhere? Have you been able to have any kind of forgiveness to that person?
Speaker 2:not. That's a hard one to come to. You know, grief is really interesting. I often compare it to standing on the beach and you get up in the morning and you say, okay, today is going to be really great, and you're walking along the beach and then all of a sudden a wave comes in and you're surrounded by water all around you and I, you know, talk to patients a lot about that Like you're going to seem like you're going to have a really good day, and so for your question is you know, I think that I've moved on as much as I can.
Speaker 2:I have, you know, bad days and good days, a lot more good days. You know, I think that there's something to say for at time heals all wounds, and so you certainly think about it much less. But you know, I think that the quilting has, you know, the artwork has really helped me in many ways. Again, some that I don't even really think about. It's either sit around and think about this or get busy on this fabulous curb quilt. In many ways I think that I've moved on, but I also have family members who we were all just kind of struck, even though it was one person my father who was taken from this earth. Everybody is dealing with it in their own ways, on different days, and in ways that we probably will not ever really understand.
Speaker 1:I really like what you said there about grief, because you know, one thing I would like to stress on this podcast to anybody who's listening if you're ever having a conversation with someone and you cry because of any kind of grief so that could be the death of someone or the loss of someone loss of a friend, loss of a romantic partner, loss of a dog, whatever it is If there's some sort of grief there and you cry, please don't apologize. How many times do we sit there with a friend and, as you say, the wave hits us. We suddenly get the lump in the throat, the tears, and then the first thing people say is I'm sorry. I'm sorry, we should not apologize for our emotions because, as you say, it's a wave that comes out of nowhere. I've been through it with my father, not in such a way that you did, but I can only imagine the shock, because when I got the phone call, I was actually getting ready to drive to go and see my dad, which was 100 miles to drive. So I was about to set off and then my stepsister rang me and as soon as I saw her ringing me because that didn't normally happen I knew. And then she said I'm sorry, rachel. He passed about an hour ago and I just sat I remember sitting on the edge of the bed my hands on my knees, for 20 minutes. I did not know where to look, what to say, and sadly I had no one around me because my husband was working away, my daughter was out, my mom lives 100 miles away. My daughter was out, my mom lives a hundred miles away. I rang a couple of friends. They were at work and I just sat there for 20 minutes and then, as you say, you go through the processes. So it is a shock.
Speaker 1:But I saw something the other day and it was a lady who she was actually on a TV show and she said oh, I'm sorry, because she burst into tears. And this person is expert. That was talking about grief. He said I find that when I'm trying to distract myself from what you've just done, burst into tears. He said if I'm working or if I'm painting or if I'm singing, the grief just waits until I'm done. And then it says are you ready now? So it is very difficult to you can't avoid it. You have to go through it and you have to sit in that pain and you have to let those tears fall and you have to let every, every emotion out, because if you try and avoid it, it will just keep coming back stronger and stronger, learned of being a nurse and being in the presence of people when they were experiencing grief or dying, or their family members.
Speaker 2:It's the thing that I've always learned, and it's silence. And it is when you are with someone, I mean, and we are all like I don't know what to say. What could you teach me? What could I say when somebody says that, or what do I do when somebody is crying? And it's like presence, be quiet, just be there for people. And it's the hardest thing to learn, because we're human beings, we're supposed to communicate, we're supposed to have the perfect thing to say. We're the cupcake that's going to make you feel better. And sometimes it's just the presence of being with people. And you know a lot of people get angry, that are grieving when you try to say things like you'll feel better tomorrow or I know exactly what you're feeling, because I've been through it.
Speaker 2:That's a terrible thing to say, because even when two people experience exactly the same thing, the experience is different. So advice would be you know, just silence. And I'm wishing, I wish you peace. I know that this will be. You know this is going to take a long time and you may never get over it, but I'm just present and so, or hey, go make a quilt, you know.
Speaker 1:As you did. Well, let's talk about that transition to quilting, then, and let's talk about being present. So yeah, you had come to a natural end for your career, hadn't you? It's not like you stopped your career in the middle and started. You were coming to the end of your career. I think you said you were thinking about retiring. You were no longer needing to do it anymore, and you were at a stage in your life where you thought, okay, I can stop this now, I'm ready, I'm going to try something else. So had you always been artistic throughout that entire 30-year period?
Speaker 2:always been artistic throughout that entire 30-year period, not really. I tinkered with a few things. I have some things ornament kind of things that I made maybe 20 years ago when I was feeling the desire to be a little crafty, if you want to use that word. If I wanted to be a crafty monkey, I would go and make you know, try to make something. And I made this beautiful bird. It was kind of like a Christmas ornament. It was a blue bird because I had friends who really liked that and it was felt and it had beautiful crystals on it. And I gave it to him and he said you really need to get a sewing machine. You really need to. I mean, this is beautiful and thank you for this. And you know, I know you worked a month on it, but you really need to get a sewing machine. And I'm like, no, I came from a family of sewers who did it out of necessity because they needed blankets.
Speaker 2:Both my grandmothers were sewers. My mother, you know I remember my mother made my again because we didn't have a lot of money. She made my blazer for me that I wore to the high school dance. So my you know my mother could make clothing and, and I just never really thought about doing sewing. And plus I had this really thought about doing sewing and plus I had this really busy life, like I was traveling around the world talking about cancer. But as that started to subside, that active professional life, I thought, wow, what am I going to do? What am I going to do with my life towards retirement? And because I was in the military for 20 years, I get a pension. You know, we have healthcare. So it made it a little easier for me to start thinking about doing something else.
Speaker 2:Anyway, I bought an inexpensive sewing machine like a hundred dollars, and the rest is history. I mean, I just loved it. I just love putting pieces together. And then I started making pieces together. And then I started making traditional quilts. And then I got to this point where I didn't really like using these patterns and oh, your points aren't perfect on a pattern. And then I just started getting a little crazy with my work, if that's a great way to explain that.
Speaker 2:And then taking some classes. Everything I learned from the first two years because it was during COVID was in classes like, well, crafty Monkeys wasn't there yet, but, mr Domestic, you know watching those and just beginning to make things, and it was really the instructors that helped me to understand. If I do have a talent here, it is like Sheila Frampton Cooper, like Nancy Crow, like Irene Roderick, I mean these people that have really, really helped me. And that's how it all, you know, really started. And then I got a bigger machine and a long arm and more fabric than I'm ever going to know what to do with. So that's kind of how it all came, started coming together.
Speaker 1:So when did you begin to realize that you had a style? Because you definitely. I mean, I look at a piece and I go, that's a Carl piece. There is definitely a style now. So when did you begin to see that forming? And was that a conscious thing? Or I have to work in this kind of way because that's my thing, or did it always just naturally happen? And you go, I've done it again. I've done it again.
Speaker 2:Yeah Well, first of all I want to go back and say I'm not disparaging at all people who do patterns and quilting, and that because I think that is really super amazing, and right now I'm needing a new bedspread, so I'm kind of thinking about doing something out of a pattern. But I did pretty quickly realize that it was fun, but it was if I probably would have left quilting, if I had just continued to do patterns. And, um, I think I got to the end of the year and I thought, um, if I'm going to move forward in this, I feel that there is something else there, Is it? Um, improv, which was really what it was, was about making my own pieces, and so I did start doing that, and so a lot of my improv work came from working with Irene Roderick I mean, Sheila Frampton Cooper is the person who taught me to do curves. So I did this quote called New Beginnings, and it was in January of, I guess, 2003. And I had made a decision at the beginning of 2003 that I was going to only do improv work. And I made a piece and I submitted it to QuiltCon and it was accepted as a small piece and it was then the new beginnings. That's exactly what that meant was. I'm starting a new, something new which has really kind of grown. It's kind of blown up.
Speaker 2:I mean I think that I think we were talking about this the other day is that I think that everybody has some kind of artistic impression or persuasion pottery, singing, quilting and that you just have to find the right one. And I found the right one. At QuiltCon there was this five-year-old boy I don't know if you saw this. It was really cool. He had entered a quilt and it won an award. And I said on Instagram to the mother who was instilling in these two young men it's really cool if you want to sew and you're five years old and you know, maybe it doesn't have to be soccer or football or it's, you know, kind of the art of it, the impression, and I'm just kind of happy that I found. I found my way to it and I had huge plans for the next piece and the next piece and the next piece and um, and trying to get my things to change more to look like carl's um, as a challenge as well yeah, do you think it's important to do that for you, carl?
Speaker 1:because you know, I think that some artists just kind of stay in their lane, which is absolutely brilliant. That's not been disparaging at all, but but there are some I mean, russell Barrett is springing to mind a little that actually some of his pieces are completely different. Like he'll have a dancing shirt and then he'll have something else with a tea towel stuck in the middle and some dots around it, which makes it sound rubbish. It's not as superb, because I love his sustainability angle, but it's completely different to the dancing shirt. So, but with you, do you think you want to stay in your lane and you want to really work at that, or can you see yourself completely going off piste?
Speaker 2:I see myself doing the work that I'm doing, which would be improv work, curve work, but I do, even if you look at the things that I've done two years ago and how they've changed and the use of color and motion. So I think I will stay in that area. Like, I mean, I think Scott Colley's RuPaul portrait quilt is the most amazing thing that I've ever. You know, I just think it's amazing. Plus, I have a lot of respect for RuPaul. No-transcript. Wow, it looks like a kitchen sink, like you just threw all that fabric up there. And then there are other people that think it's so fine tuning it. I think, and I think all artists you know, I think all artists do that.
Speaker 1:Are you as driven in your quilting as you were in your nursing? Because I sense, like you said, with your nursing you know you kept expanding your knowledge and doing different things to do with your main career. You were always looking to do the next thing, the next thing. So is it the same with your quilting? Are you sort of replacing that drive that you had for your nursing now into your art?
Speaker 2:I have never felt more like myself ever than I do right now, and I feel like I have found who I was supposed to be, and that doesn't mean that it wasn't negative for the work that I have done. But I am really happy with where I am in my life. But I am really happy with where I am in my life and I wake up every day thinking about my fiber artwork. And you know, because I'm a cancer nurse, I know that everything can change in a moment. You wake up and you have abdominal pain or you know, or you have a seizure, and so I know that time is limited and I have a lot of. I have a lot of work to do.
Speaker 2:Recently, one of my mentors said how serious are you about this? And it's like I have never been more serious about anything even, I think, oncology or cancer nursing than I have been about this. I'm serious about my family, my dog, my relationships and this, and it is everything. It is everything to me and I just feel like I've. I finally feel like I'm the person that I was really supposed to be and that probably meant that I probably should have gone to art school. I probably should have, and you know, I just turned 60 and I wish I had started this when I'm 20. But unless we have some magic wand and we can set time back, you got the time you've got. So it's. But I'm very, very dedicated to this and it's for me now, it's for the work that I'm doing, is for me. Yeah, a ribbon would be nice on occasion, because I think that gives you a little bit of confirmation, but it really is for me and I think that's a really great place to be in.
Speaker 1:It is think that's a really great place to be in it is. Do you think your work now is teaching you anything about yourself that you didn't know?
Speaker 2:before. Well, everything in life, I think, teaches you. You know something new. There's always a lesson. I've been talking a lot about the flip side of everything recently, like, oh, that person cut me off on when I was driving, but the flip of that is maybe there was an accident that was waiting. That you know trying to. That's a silly comparison, but you know, like the flip of all of that.
Speaker 1:So yeah, can I just say. I was at the beach this weekend with my daughter. I had woken up I suffer from really bad migraines and I'd woken up with day two of a migraine and, um, I took some drugs, some drugs, some medications, and then my friend's daughter came over because we'd agreed we're going to do something and I still really don't feel that great. And he said look, let's go to the beach, you can have some fresh air, I'll drive. So he drove us to the beach and, um, as I was walking down that beach, gradually the migraine started to lift and eventually it went. But we, just, we, went on a ghost train. We, I mean, I was like a kid with them. They were 18 years old and I was suddenly 18, but we went on a ghost train. We, we, um, played crazy golf, um, we did all these crazy things.
Speaker 1:And then we sat on a bench and we're looking at the sea and my daughter, madison, said what is one thing that we're all grateful for in our lives? And I said well, you start. And she said I'm grateful for my relationships that I have, like my family, my partner and Brandon said I'm really grateful for being able to look at the sea and to see it and have this moment. And I said I am grateful for everything that has gone wrong in my life as well as everything that's gone right, because everything has taught me a lesson. And he said I was thinking exactly the same.
Speaker 1:It is so important to look at things as the positive. If people hurt you, if people are disrespectful to you, well, that's teaching you that you are now going to have to grow some respect for yourself and create stronger boundaries. You know that guy who's driving crazy. Maybe that's you know. As you say, there was something that happened up the road that saved you from being in that moment. You always have to look at the flip of everything, because if you don't, you're just going to be in a dark place.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love that, the flip, or I'm sure there's some other really pay it forward, or you know the what would have happened? Or and it's also being able to stop and think about what you have good in your life, because in this world right now it's really easy to think about everything that's wrong, or that there are really wrong or bad people in the world and the world is made up of that, and that's not the case. Those people are banging the drums, they're loud on in the parade, walking down the street, but there's the rest of us who are bystanders, that are good people, that do things for other people, that help, and that kind of reminds me of you know, I did a lot of teaching in nursing school and I've had people say well, why is it that? Why you want to be another improv teacher.
Speaker 2:I feel like I'm giving back in a way, because there are hundreds of people that are wanting to learn a quilting technique and there are 10 teachers, let's say, and so 11, one more added to the group and trying to find some way to give back to the people who have given to me. No, I don't think I've got some really brilliant improv teaching that somebody else hasn't done. I have some techniques. It's giving back, and nursing is a lot like that too. If you had a good nursing instructor the person you work with in the trenches that taught you the right way to do things, then you will end up being a good nurse yourself, and so that's kind of why I'm interested in the flip, giving back a little bit.
Speaker 1:How is that for?
Speaker 2:connecting that all together.
Speaker 1:I love that, it's beautiful. But do you know, carl? I think that's why you are becoming so successful at what you do, because you are, you're gaining notoriety. You got your pieces entered into QuiltCon this year, I mean, and there were so many on the morning that I woke up I'm a reject, I'm a reject, I'm a reject. There were so many people who have been rejected and you were one who said I feel very blessed, I've got my piece in to quilt con, which is fantastic, but you are getting recognition, you are working with incredible people, you are striving, but I think what the reason that it's working for you are from your talent, which is obvious, is that you that lovely thing you just said about wanting to give back. And that's what life is about If you go at it from the right angle.
Speaker 1:It's like when I started this business, it was out of necessity because I'd lost my job and I had to come up with a way to earn some money, and I thought well, I've been working in this industry, I've been selling all these machines on this TV channel. Why don't I try and at least give people an amazing experience to learn how to use the machines? Now, obviously, I was looking at facts and figures and I thought, well, I could make some money from this. Of course we all have to make money, but I did want people.
Speaker 1:I kind of felt bad that for years I'd stood there selling machines and actually there were a lot of people who probably bought them and still hadn't got them out of the box and that was like, well, look, I can bring some people to teach you. But then, as time has gone on and I'm immersed in this community, like you are, and you see the joy from people when they learn a new method, when they have done something they never thought they could, when they're proud of what they do, when they get something into a competition, when someone in the class says, oh, I love that color choice, and they go really, oh, it's a pink fabric I bought at the something store. Isn't it fantastic? And that's what life is about it's giving back.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think you're really a conduit for this too, and I said this the other day and didn't mean to embarrass you, but I really think that you're onto something here. But you can just see where there's just so much need and it's doing something that makes people feel good about themselves. Go into your studio or into your bedroom or wherever it is that you're working and you can do something. And what I like about your model, it isn't just quilting. I just think it's brilliant. I just think it's gee, why didn't I think of that? You know it's like. So I think that you're going to have a lot of success from that.
Speaker 1:It does feel good, I know it's like.
Speaker 2:So I think that you're going to have a lot of success from that. It does feel good. And now look how this breaking the blocks is coming out of this creativity. I mean, I just talked about a person having trauma in their life or gender differences or all of the things which was kind of.
Speaker 2:The point that I'm making is that you, you've got these people that are walking around and we are all fighting some kind of battle and you don't have to bring people together to talk about things that everybody's dealing with. You could just stay in the lane of the craft, think about the lives that you are going to bring together, touch. You know, hey, there's somebody I experienced an exact kind of trauma and I felt the same way somebody watching that, and so good for you. You're bringing, you know you're bringing people together and, frankly, there are a lot of blogs out there. So I like it that there's a mix of creativity and those some of your creative teachers or creative people that you found to kind of talk about their personal life, because then it makes other people realize like, oh, maybe my life isn't so bad, or there are other people that have experienced that. So yeah.
Speaker 2:I think it's a great model.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you, carl, and I'm so glad to have you as part of it, because I just love your dulcet tones, I love your messages and you leave me the voice messages. I just literally it's like a bedtime story. Um so, carl, when you are sewing, when you are putting your curves together and you're choosing your fabrics, and you're really into it, what does this do for you in that moment? What is it doing for you? Is it like a meditation?
Speaker 2:Well, first of all, I don't choose the colors. They choose me. No, I don't choose the fabrics. They jump up into my hands. I kind of joke around about that, Um play with me, play with me.
Speaker 2:Wow it, the world just goes away. You know, it's kind of like I start working on something at noon and I look up and it's five o'clock and I'm like, oh, the dog needs to be walked, oh, I've got to make something for dinner or oh, I should have gone to the grocery store. So it definitely does make the world just go away, and 99% of the time that's good just go away, and 99% of the time that's good. But I also have to remember that I have a spouse who, you know, would like to have a relationship and talk, and so you know, I have to close things down a little bit. So, but it really just makes the world go away and the things that you're worried about.
Speaker 2:If you can sew for a little while, put those things on the back burner for a while and then go back and face them. It's just everything you know, and it's not always sewing, maybe it's organizing fabrics or it's posting on Instagram and I'm sure a lot of the people that you have asked the same question. It's just like it's just a solution, a really great elixir that helps you with life and feel good about yourself and not take yourself too seriously or be angry with that person that cut you off. You know it's like hurry up, get out of the way so I can get home, so I can get back to the sewing machine. So it's really done a lot for me. And you know, when I started thinking about retirement, I had a friend who uh, more of an acquaintance that had spent a year in retirement and said oh, I am so excited because in my year of retirement I have done every level of Candy Crush, the game Candy Crush.
Speaker 2:And I'm saying to myself that is exactly what I don't want to do. You know, I can show you. I can show you how I have spent my time over the last year or the last three months, and it was, you know, wanting not just retiring and sitting in a chair and trying to take care of myself physically so that I can have more time to do the things that I want.
Speaker 2:And you know all about that, because it will not be unusual for me to send you an Instagram voice message and A. I'm short of breath because I've got my heart rate up and you can hear like banging barbells and on the stepping machine right but it's that point of uh trying to keep myself healthy so that I can have the time. That's how serious I take this is. I want to be around to be able to do this stuff.
Speaker 1:Okay, so what is the dream. Yes, what is the dream? Come on. What's the dream when?
Speaker 2:are you going to be? Where are?
Speaker 1:you going to go? Where's this going to take you? Where do you want? Come on. I wave a magic wand like Tinkerbell, and all of your dreams have come true in this fiber world. What does that look like?
Speaker 2:It kind of looks like what I'm living right now. I would like to say I'd like to, you know, have best in show at QuiltCon sometime, and you know that is in the back of my mind, but I'm learning more and more that I'm only going to get to that point by doing the really great work that I want to do. So I think it's living the life that I'm living making more great quilts, having personal relationships with other people that are interested in the same thing, maybe building the fiber art world a bit, because it's not always been recognized. If you went for master's work, it would be a master's in pottery a master, and so to bring fiber along. So I really am pretty much living the life. You know I would be. I would hang a big quilt con ribbon right here, but that I'm joking about that mostly. So I think I'm living the. I'm almost where it is that I want to be and having more time to do that.
Speaker 1:And I think it's for that reason, carl, that you will get that ribbon, because if you are constantly wanting, wanting, wanting and not happy where you are, you'll always be wanting, but I think, because you're happy where you are, a lot more things will happen for you. I always ask, carl, if I remember and I have remembered on this occasion what the motto would be Do you have a life motto?
Speaker 2:I do and it's not mine. A patient told me this a long time ago, and now I might cry because this is, you know, as I've shared with you. I've spent a lot of time with people in their final hours, and then none of them ever say, gee, I wish I would have spent more time at work. But his motto was you never see a U-Haul or a moving truck following a hearse, and you know. So I really think about that a lot, like you can't take it with you. You can't take the, can't take the fabric with you. You can't uh, I guess you could try. You can't take the experiences with you. And so the point of all of that is do whatever it is you want to do right now and make yourself and the people in your life happy. And so there you go.
Speaker 1:It's so true we all end up in the same way.
Speaker 2:Do they call it a? Is it a U-Haul?
Speaker 1:No, I've never heard of a U-Haul, but I know a moving truck.
Speaker 2:Moving truck. U-haul is a brand of moving truck here.
Speaker 1:It's so true you can't take it with you.
Speaker 2:Can't take it with you.
Speaker 1:Well, I'll tell you something, carl I feel absolutely blessed. Um, I really, in the last I'd like I'd say the last 10 months for me, um, a big shift has happened for me in many ways, and on a personal level as well. But I really feel like all these amazing people are crossing my path and it's like where did you come from? But welcome, and you know, you are one of those people from just doing a live, and then your name pops up, and then I look at you, and then we chat and here you are, and you know I'm sitting here thinking well, I really wish that I lived in Palm Springs, because I'd be around the pool.
Speaker 2:You can come for a visit.
Speaker 1:With the pool boy.
Speaker 2:Pool person, boy pool person. But I agree with you and I feel the same way, rachel, about uh the interactions that we've had and also again watching. I mean you're bringing some of my favorite uh people that I really respect in uh the quilt world and you're doing a great job bringing them on. So I don't know, you must, I don't know. It's kind of like you're like Barbara Walters and you're bringing all these, really these people that are influential or I think it's because they have something to say in the art that they're doing, and then again you start talking to them as a person and you learn things about them.
Speaker 1:So yeah, well, long may it continue.
Speaker 2:Well, barbara Walters was doing it for a long, long time, if you go back and look in the 70s, and probably somebody that made a great difference in broadcasting and maybe brought other women along.
Speaker 1:Well, I'll tell you something. I'm honored. I'm honored to be the Barbara Walters of the crafting world. I am honored with that title.
Speaker 2:I love it.
Speaker 1:I love it. Carl, thank you so much for your time today and for your honesty, your stories, your vulnerability and, of course, for your lovely pieces, because they are beautiful. They really are. I look at them and I see joy. I see this explosion of colour. They make me feel happy when I look at them, and long may you continue to keep doing them. So thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you. It was my pleasure to be with you. Thank you.
Speaker 1:Just before you go, lovely listener, can I ask you a favour? If you have a friend who you think Thank you enjoyed this, it would really help me if you would give me a little quick like or a comment, especially if you're listening on one of the podcast platforms. It just means that when anybody lands on the page, they can see that people have reviewed it, they've liked it, enjoyed it and got something out of it. So if you wouldn't mind leaving me a review, that would be amazing. And the final thing to say is that if you are a business and you're thinking how do I get my message out there, well, you could do it on this podcast. All you have to do is reach out to me. Rachel at breakingtheblockscom. The details are below in the box. Thank you so much to everybody who's subscribing, listening, liking, leaving comments and just generally enjoying the podcast.
