Being led into the white unknown

Ice halo phenomena, taken just outside Tibet

~ photo from Imgur ~

Aside from my love of white flowers, I might describe myself as someone who is allergic to white.

I don't venture into that pristine territory willingly and in fact, there's something about white that generally sets my teeth on edge.  There is no other color that makes me feel this way.

With that in mind, I have been taking this small statement to heart:

The obstacle is the path

~ Zen proverb ~

back view of Kate Middleton's wedding gown

The problem, as I've been chewing on it, started [most likely] with these garments ... I never was the kind of girl who adored the idea of a white wedding; who yearned for it, plotted and planned for that exquisite white-filled ceremony.  To the contrary, give me a good 'ole elopement any day ... in street clothes and comfy walking shoes.

While all those dreams of lacy white brought most gals some sense of profound joy,

for me, I felt only this ....

   

photo by Daniele + Iango

~ for Comme des Garcons, spring/summer 2012 ~

constricted.

Door at 'Stay' hotel, Copenhagen

Then jude chose WHITE  for the first journey in What-If Diaries ... and said "self is the place to start"...

so in order to stay with that thought, I did what I usually do when I am blocked and started to 

explore my limitations [through pictures].

I figured that if I needed to put out the privacy tag on my internal wonderings at some point, 

the What-Iffers would probably understand.

So it began.

photo by Christer Strömholm - Fox-Amphoux, France, 1960

When I first saw this photo I thought to myself, oh, how I adore lace, but  this  kind of lace ...

grungy, utilitarian;  torn by use, weather, wind .... genealogy.

No longer pure, certainly not pristinely white.

And as I thought on, I thought how this also explains my current affair, my love of reusing old cloth.

I pulled out all the whites I own.  Silence.

Nada.

Not one drop of inspiration to be found.

Then I began a word list,

starting with the literal ...

Kidergarden Cerdanyola del Valles

~ photo by Nico Baumgarten ~

Light.

~ photo by shila.wilson ~

Albino.

recipe for homemade pasta

~ from Pure Vege ~

Flour.

Before too long, a switch turned ... I began looking at white as an abstraction,

a concept, a descriptor.

~ photo by Patrick Hidden ~

White geometry ...

Vanessa Redgrave

beautiful age ...

1920's handmade drop waist dress

white as something that is barely there ...

Alexander McQueen, autumn/winter 2006-2007

or    boldly   there with a contrasty companion ...

:::

Many, many days into these exercises now and I no longer have that strong sense of white being such a negative space.   The edges seem to be rubbed smooth around my earlier sensitivity.  Somewhat.

Still, I'm feeling a bit like this fella on the tightrope.

copper plate etching by Brodsky and Utkin

I've some distance to go yet.

Hopefully, I won't get too many of these along the way ....

wrinkles

~ photo by Tim Flach ~