What Saves Us

Looking After by Tracy WeilOver at Soul Pancake, the question is big: What Art Has Saved Your Life?

Poetry saved my life, I often say. As an asthmatic youngster rushed in and out of hospitals, books were my first friends. But looking back, books were just the first in a series of artful steps that paved my way, and saved my life. 

Music helped me endure the agony of adolescence. And isn't this true for many of us? The soundtrack of adolescence always plays. For me, it's an eclectic blend: Pink Floyd's Comfortably Numb, The Cure's Lost in a Forest, Jackson Browne's Running on Empty.

In high school, writing, in the form of the school newspaper (Thank you, Mrs. Trembath), saved me. In journalism, I found direction, purpose, and an excuse to enter the lives of others.

In college, suicidal, visual art was my tourniquet. Vincent Van Gogh, Georgia O'Keeffe, Auguste Rodin, Stanton Englehart, and perhaps most importantly, Tracy Weil, who became a lifelong friend and a partner in artful collaborations that included home decor, handmade books, and poetry-painting exhibitions.

Still and again, art -- in all its forms -- ignites, excites, inspires, and saves me. Has art saved you?