identity

Ceci and Jennifer 1996

So you meet a friend that blows your mind and busts wide open your heart because they draw from the same pool of inspiration that you do, thrive from the same stimulus, and dream of such similar possibilities of life and art and adventure.  Feels amazing, feels like home, feels like you were always together even during all those years alone.   Jennifer and I rode O so high on this very experience in the first year of our meeting. We were an unstoppable team, ready for anything, together nothing could hinder us!  We were sure that through our childhood years, growing up as only kids with mostly only ourselves to entertain us and play with us, that we somehow- perhaps metaphysically- must have been together growing up. We thought, maybe we were eachother's imaginary friends, and that at last we had materialized in eachother's lives at the age of 21! 

Our bond was so seamless, and it was exhilarating, until another experience reared its unexpected head, one I can only describe as an identity crisis.  The bond is so seamless that at some point you start to ask, where do you end and I begin, are my thoughts my own, who am I as an individual?  About a year into our manifesting friendship (1996-1997, UCSB) I remember starting to feel conflicting emotions between my great admiration for Jennifer and a surprising rising up of resentment.  I began to feel that I was losing my own definition, I began to fear this divine connection.  The truth was, as I can see it clearly now, that this was something I was going through all on my own in this critical time and age of my life.  Not only was I shifting into adult from child, I had also just been through a traumatic accident that had me piecing myself back together from scratch (which I will share further about later).  While the identity challenges presented by the twin activating powers of Jennifer and Cec were for real,  I now know it was also a reflection of my own inner turmoil of self identification during that time. 

A great partnership is made from two whole individuals.  Jennifer and I have grown to not fear our kinship, knowing that it does not extract anything from our individual selves, it only adds to and enriches our lives and what we create.  We celebrate eachother's choices, we acknowledge eachother's special qualities and offerings.  And we revere all the ways we continue to correlate and connect and correspond, because we Are truly a reflection for each other, but not of what we are not -which comes from fear... we help reflect to one another all that we Are - which comes out of trust. 

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A couple months later I was in Guadalajara (1997), recovering from my accident and renewing myself on all levels, including my art.  I came across this image in the newspaper (on the left) of the mirrored figure on stairwell.  I cut it out and pasted it in ZBOOK, feeling Jennifer, feeling our great opportunity to transcend the challenges of sharing such immaculate reflection and with trust allowing it to be a great source in our lives for creating great work, together and individually.  Later other dualistic images emerged on this page, as well as a reflective "mirrored" piece of sticker on the right above the drawing of Fiona (which appears mostly blue in this photo-scan).   Jennifer dropped in the "Calling All Angels" and I love it because for me it reminds us that we are all indeed unique individuals, or angels if you will, And we are ALL called forth to synergize our individual talents to create further growing unique creative experiences.  It is an honor to head this call with you Hemphill.

∞ ceci

6

names

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Jennifer recently wrote a comment in reply to the "Happy May 16th !" post from last week.  It is a great conversation to open up, especially in connection with this week's page of "Identity."  In her 5/25 comment she writes:

So, in this post, you have used many namings of both I and you... I like that, because it allows a fluidity to live in me with the nomen of J.

I was feeling a bit overused as J., starting to have a sense in myself that perhaps it is more like a signature (which is how I often use it) versus a calling name - though I do like it also... thus, please hear my jabble that i am feeling slightly confused in continuing to be called hear J. all the time

thanks,
~J~

I wrote a comment back to her today and I would like to share again here:

I hear you, here dear Jennifer Hemphill Gould, my cherished friend.  Strangely enough, I am quite unfamiliar with calling you by your name, Jennifer.  I, as with many of our ol' homies from school, have relished calling you by your incredible and wonderful maiden name of Hemphill, for practically as long as ZBOOK has walked this earth.  I have a long standing relationship and thus a heartfelt affection for your maiden name, which is as much your name to me as my name of cec is to you.  As we began to embark on a road of public arena with ZBOOK 4EVER, I tried out a route where I would call you by how you chose to identify yourself in here: J.   I hear you that, rather than a name, it is a signature.  Okay love.  My jabble now is that it is your name of Hemphill that flows so organically from my lips and my pen and my fingers as I type.  I will however, if it is your wish, refer to you as Jennifer in our blogging (with dashes of Hemphill here and there when I just can't help it! :) .  Of course I am aware that Jennifer is in fact your name, given and chosen for the world to know you by!  And I love it because it's you.  And I also love your other birth name, which I have celebrated since we were young pups. I love you Hemphill.

∞ 6

And so let it be known... my dear friend and sister to my heart, Jennifer, is lovingly known to me as Hemphill, the last name she had before she did wed, her maiden name, her nickname in our PSL circle of college buddies, and an exquisite name to boot.  Her name first is indeed Jennifer.  Hemphill, I do love how you use your complete and full name of Jennifer.  I know you are also Jen to some people (and at first to me), but Jennifer to most and that is actually quite lovely in the light of so many 'Jen's in our American lives.  The choice to primarily use your full 'Jennifer' re-roots the name in its elegance and integrity.  It does speak of you. You do wear it well.  

PS(L): Please do feel free to call me by any of my names in here!  You did call me ~supercec~ in your comment in reply to 5/10's post, which you signed ~Hemphill... :)!  Sweet.  Call me Ceci, Cec, supercec, super, 6, super6... or even Cece which is what has organically flown from your fingertips on hundreds of correspondences to me from you.  I am your cec-ster 4ever.

love,

cec

6

week six >> "identity"

Calling All Angels to our vision.  We stand in action before you with dreams united to share our story of collaboration and friendship caught on fire.  We dedicate our work to inspiring others to create and share and unlock imaginations offerings.  Week to week, we pledge to bring forth our reflections and wisdoms as we express zbooks magic and velocity. 

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Into and out of the ether, we crystallize our common goal to bring light and life to the threads which bind us in book and image making together.  Through our musings of our weekly spread choices, we ignite vast organizing forces to conspire in our destiny.  Great wealth and opportunity, we call on you also to feed our bonfire of artistry and story telling.

With our individuality fueling our co-creations, we sing forth to the universe to mirror our pictures.

In prayer and thanksgiving, we focus our hearts and minds and wills to move ever forward toward the great unknown with courage and faith and knowledge that we are not alone. 

Shout it out loved ones - we invite you to join in our building of zbooks storyline - please know, we do not ever profess to hold monopoly on interpretation or understanding of the work we engage in.  Feel free to share your thoughts in comments.  gracias

-J.