What is beyond the stars?

“The man who has many answers
Is often found
In the theaters of information
Where he offers, graciously,
His deep findings.

While the man who has only questions,
To comfort himself, makes music.”

 -Mary Oliver

            I still remember the first time that I came to Cincinnati. Out of the dark the orange glow of collective streetlights began to appear on the horizon. The sure sign of city life up ahead. It was night as we approached the orange glow. As rolling hills began to consume our vehicle, lights began to appear on them. There was no subtle transition. We came around a corner and there they were. All across the windshield splattered a constellation of lights that where up on the hills. It was such a shock from driving through a few hundred country miles. They were so mesmerizing to our road weary minds. Out of the inkiness of night, Cincinnati began to show itself. As we passed the forms, I wondered what was behind each of the shapes. There must be some semblance of structure or tower behind what we saw jut up out of the hills. I just couldn’t know. Night would not give up the secrets of those shapes.

            Once morning came, I was able to see the true scope of what the city held behind its sentinel guardians of light. I had no context to put those forms into when I first saw them. In the morning, I couldn’t find out what was behind them because I didn’t know what I had seen.

            Life is like this often. I am now living inside the streetlights and I still don’t get to know what the constellations where on my first visit. We are always trying to figure out what is beyond the stars; perhaps not in a literal sense, but still we are all looking for some kind of answers. Even though I get to see the city in the daylight, I may never know what those original shapes I saw were.

            This is how question asking is. It’s the intoxicating draw that all problem solvers are addicted to. Ask any scientist, artist, researcher, or any other professional for that matter. Human’s curiosity has kept us at the cutting edge of every technology since the sharp stick. Even when we truly know what is behind the stars that we see at night, we will ask what is beyond that, and so on, and so on. Once I made this realization, and really came to terms with accepting the unknown. Not knowing is a form of knowing, that you just don’t know yet.

            As I set up my studio in Cincinnati for the Manifest Residency, that I have been recently awarded, I think about asking questions. Or, just the act of asking questions in general. Part of being an artist, some may say even being human, is being okay that some of your questions won’t be answered. Some days we will have been in the studio for hours and when we get home ask ourselves what we even did all day. It is difficult to get away from this kind of mind set.

            As I move into a heavy season of making, I remind myself it is alright to “feel like you’ve got nothing done.” Showing up is just as much a part of the process as doing is. It’s not a measurement of how much was done, but rather what was done.