Lessons — Sarah Haskell

Lessons

I have just returned home from a nearly three month sabbatical in Bali and SE Asia.

We cut our trip short and arrived home on March 20th to a very different scene than the one we left in January.

This trip was a true sabbatical - a time away from my life here in Maine.

I listened to new bird sounds, looked at how people lived in many countries, tasted new and strange foods, touched and fed an elephant, felt the water spray from an amazing waterfall and explored the twisting paths of Ubud.

I met people that have never gone more than a few miles from home. I prayed in temples built thousands of years ago. I walked bare foot on beaches with black sand. I learned how to breath underwater and swam with hundreds of colored fish. I tasted honey made by an insect I cannot name. I dipped my hands into indigo dye vats following traditional Indonesian recipes. I sang with grasshoppers at sunset. And I calmed my heart by listening to the ocean.

And now I have this incredible gift of time (thanks to social distancing regulations) to reflect and process this sabbatical.

And yet - how strange it is to be contemplating this wealth of experiences in a time of great pain and suffering. Covid-19 knows no boundaries - it does not separate us by the color of skin, the size of our bank account, or our education or profession. We are all vulnerable to this virus.

Since I choose to work with organic materials that are especially vulnerable to weathering and aging, I have reflected on the quality of vulnerability both in my art and myself.

If there is one lesson we can learn from Covid-19, it is that we are all vulnerable - it is our common human mortality.

My prayer is that our human family grows an awareness of our common vulnerability and develops a wider compassion for all beings.

Be well, stay at home. We are all in this together.

Make art to tell your story.

Sarah

April 4, 2020