Design Milk feature

Career achievement unlocked; my work made its way onto Design Milk! I’m always so appreciative and thankful when someone reaches out and wants to offer a platform to get more eyes on my work. Say what you want about the negatives of social media, but I have gained many opportunities because of my constant presence on Instagram. A couple weeks ago, the editor-in-chief of Design Milk, Caroline Williamson, reached out to ask if she could feature ‘The Fairies will find us if we leave a trail,’ for her upcoming bi-monthly column Take 5, where she shares 5 recent favorites across the design spectrum. She told me she had been a fan of my Lego work for awhile and would love the chance to share it with her readers. I had received the email on a day when I also spent two hours crying about the situation with my dad’s health and the chill it’s had on my work momentum. I told her the message was a bright spot in a difficult stretch and I was so thankful. This is something I am doing more and more, letting people know when their support truly impacts me in a positive way. And the more I am doing it, the more help I am receiving. Karma is real and its language is vulnerability.

I never used to let anyone know I needed help or might benefit from help. When I did ask, I often rejected it as soon as it was presented, confusing the person I had just requested help from. It’s not the same if I have to ask, I’d always told myself and them. I never wanted anyone to know I put in effort, and I never wanted anyone to feel obligated to help me, not even my parents. The fundamental core feeling I must do it my way made me feel so isolated at times because others perceived my divergence from typical as me rejecting their way of doing it, like I thought I was better than them. This narrative persisted throughout the first half of my life. I learned to keep myself out of reach on the top shelf, fulfilling the ideas I was an untouchable because I refused to let anyone know just how fragile I was, how incapable, not unwilling, I was of doing things how they expected. I could get far on my own, but it wasn’t until my kids made me realize that vulnerability was not a bad thing, just a scary thing, that I was able to admit that I was actually deeply exhausted from being on the verge of falling my whole life. And again and again, who was it that helped me regain balance in these moments of teetering admission? Women.

I can trace a long line of women who have helped me reach the next step along my journey. In this world, we only get out what we put in, unless we are willing to take advantage of others in some way, and I have found women to be far more likely to receive vulnerability as a form of acceptable currency, whereas men often recoil from it from fear of contagion. When I was unable to admit weakness, few saw my strength, especially women; female friendships were challenging because what men wanted from me was always far clearer. But when I opened up, I saw the chain reaction it caused, the space I created for others to do the same. Women now see and accept my strength and have sent me countless messages telling me my work makes them feel seen. A handful of men reach out similarly but I still feel these men often see me as a mirror or top shelf object, not a guiding light. Only a few men throughout all my years as an artist have made me feel I have made a difference to them or like I have important things to say. Thousands of women have let me know. I cannot ignore this difference in support and what it means. Even my online analytics will show that it is women who seek my content most and who purchase my work and show my work most. And the men that do the same are decidedly not the ones who support rapists as presidents. (Any man can of course prove me wrong by becoming a vocal champion of my work in their own spaces.)

In my last post I shared how one woman essentially changed the trajectory of my life because she listened to me and believed me and was willing to go out on a limb for her belief in me. I am so privileged to have received that type of support, but I also know now that it started with my own belief I was worthy of being listened to, that the steps I was supposed to take were not the only way to get where I was going. I have always had faith in myself because I’ve had to. Sometimes it’s easy to think a person is doing it their way because they think their way is better. We don’t always consider it’s because they are incapable of doing it the way they’ve been asked or told. We often see divergence as a challenge or threat, but sometimes it is simply disability or difference that makes us shift trajectories. I cannot build Lego sets because my brain cannot rotate images and so I make many fundamental mistakes while trying to follow the diagram instructions. This leads to frustration for me and my son. I started doing Lego work in a different way because I couldn’t use the product the way it was intended to be used. Thank you Caroline and Design Milk for highlighting my work and how divergence and disability can lead us to a better world if we allow it to. Thank you Nancy, Melissa, Marilyn, Amy, Aileen, Lisa, Kary, Aline, Catherine, Dempsey, Amy (a different one), Celia, Vanessa, Leslie, Iona, Cyrilla, Alison, Kaylan, Pam, Pennylane, Danielle, Shannon, Asia, Isabela, Kristin, Jo, Grace, Jessica, Robin, Kate, Vicky, Justine, Laura, Mary, Kelsie, Janet, Courtney, Kate, Meg, Carly, and so many others who have lifted me up professionally and enabled me to reach my potential.