Note: back in October 2021, I challenged myself to use the Inktober prompts to create one black-and-white piece of art each day. I would then learn how to vectorize them in Adobe Illustrator and make some cool digital art. Two things happened in the meantime: 1) Illustrator’s learning curve proved steeper than I could find time or focus for, and 2) I started writing pieces alongside them as a writing exercise. INKTHINK is a series combining the two for the next 31 days.
Spirit is like butter on toast. Used so often and spread so thin in its use and definition that it often disappears within the bread, only visible in its gleam under certain lights. You could forget its presence until you take a bite. By then, there’s no way to deny it. It’s there, deep within everything.
The ASL sign for ghost looks the same as spirit. Both have the nondominant hand with an index finger and thumb touching while the other hand makes the same shape and draws out a squiggly line.
You could be led to think they’re the same. But the ghost haunts; the spirit reminds us of what’s possible. The attainable absolution. The brewing brain. The creative connection.
When I think about spirit, I think about how it makes our body lighter, almost immaterial. It emanates from within and makes our bodies a silhouette, a shadow behind it all. Suddenly, the aches and pains go away. The worries about money disappear. The stress that wore you down has subsided, if only for a few brief moments. The world feels a little bigger, a little wider. What didn’t seem possible before now flickers within you, a warm, neon sign saying Here I Am, Ready To Go Wherever This May Take Me.
