Thank you for the supportive comments and emails regarding my "winged messenger" project. I really do appreciate it. I would like to tell you how this project came about and I want to point out certain people who have inspired me along the way.
The winged messengers came from a sketch that I drew for J years ago when we were living in two separate countries. My husband had moved to the States months prior for his work while I finished my own contracts up in Canada. During our long distance relationship, I would write him letters and sometimes when there wasn't anything new to say, I'd send him sketches or photographs. One the sketches was of J laying in bed while envelopes with wings flew through his bedroom window.
I began making the winged envelopes a month or so ago for myself. I made six, taped them to my wall, took a photograph of them and then posted the photo on my blog. Then I got the idea to take them out into the field and into the city. It was purely a visual idea. I thought they would look beautiful moving through tall grass in a field or in a gritty urban setting.
Then Maddie of Persisting Stars wrote about her and her children leaving kind, supportive notes to strangers throughout her home town. I loved that idea! Plus, I like the idea of giving free art; that is, anyone can take a "winged messenger" home with them.
Maddie sent me a link to a website called Hope Revolution which is wonderful site encouraging people to start their own "random acts of kindness" projects. Hope Revolution has a link to a flickr site where people from around the world post up photographs of what they are doing in their own neighborhoods. It's encouraging to know that despite the often depressing news on the television or on the radio, little positive ideas for change are taking place throughout the country and in our world.
While at Karen's place last week, I looked through the latest Artful Blogging Magazine. Andrea of Hula Seventy has an interesting piece in the magazine where she describes her family's own experience of leaving kind comments around their town. What a great activity for children!
This is going to be a long term project for me. I get excited imagining where I can leave a winged messenger next. Constance of Rochambeau and her mother left a winged messenger in a Texan town last month and Olga has offered to post a winged messenger or two somewhere in Stockholm. How cool is that?!
