“What inspires your art?”
I feel like answering this can always feel so cliche to an artist — regardless of what their answer is. But it really isn’t! For me it’s my relationship with the Lord. It’s my family and the experiences we’ve gone through. It’s the people I love in this world. It’s the beautiful places I’ve traveled and the experiences I’ve had there. It’s the experiences I’ve had right here in my own country and state and city. It’s my dreams. It’s random quotes I come across. It’s beautiful music I hear. And yes…it’s even the pain I experience. It’s an intense desire to have the pain not be meaningless — to not give into it, to not let my life deteriorate in any way I have can control. These things inspire my art.
“What does the name “Across Fields” mean / where did it come from?”
It’s a bit of a convoluted story, but “Across Fields” has been my name online for…many years. I’ve had a blog with just the name “acrossfields” before; I had Across Fields Photography at one point back in the day; I’ve done custom sewing using that name on my business card…etc, etc. And when I was pursing my art back in 2014-2015 I used the name Across Fields. So, when I started up this time around more purposefully, I was deciding if I REALLY wanted to stick with the name or not. And I decided I did. Obviously. 😉
The phrase “across fields” is a line from a ballad from waaaay back — it might have even been on a vinyl record that I listened to when I was a little kid. I really loved that line for some reason, and it always stuck with me. I loved the imagery it brought to mind.
About 12 years ago I was planning to move overseas and everything fell through with that. It was a hard time for me, but the words from that childhood ballad came back to me in the midst of the heartache and laying down of dreams. “Across fields” — those two words struck me one day and it become a resounding theme of “you can serve God wherever you are, Grace … across continents, across fields, at the grocery store, in a jungle….wherever you are.”
And as time and years have passed, that’s still ultimately been such a core theme of my heart and soul. “Whether across fields or continents, wherever you are…” And, as Jim Elliot said: “Wherever you are, be all there.”
“You talk about being in pain a lot — what is that all about?”
Oooh, a fun one. 😉 Let’s dive right in. I have several incurable chronic illnesses that affect my life in various ways — some more intensely than others.
One of the diseases is kept under control pretty well if I follow specific dietary guidelines.
I’ve also got two other diseases that affect me in more prominent ways. Between the two of them, they show up pretty drastically with recurring surgeries, constant pain, internal bleeding, severe ulcers, arthritis, eye issues, and various other ongoing issues that crop up.
Learning how to live life with these chronic diseases has been an adventure, but not impossible. I have an incredible support system around me and I’ve been so stretched and stripped of anything I can depend on in myself — and I’m thankful for that.
One of the diseases I have has a high likelihood of causing blindness and could eventually lead to lesions on my brain (which would be considered terminal). Neither of those are for-sure things, but are definitely possibilities that are on the table. And at times we’ve been told that the doctors were pretty sure the lesions were present and we were just waiting on test results to confirm it. Those days of waiting were so eye-opening to me in my life — “what’s your soul-position in this time of facing a terminal disease, Grace? … are you ready?”
I’m grateful for going through times of soul-searching and refining–they’re so good for me. I don’t like the pain, I don’t like having incurable diseases that keep progressing to worse stages, I don’t like having to say no to dreams and goals, I don’t want to live like this for the rest of my life . . . but I’ve come to a point that I’m thankful for where it has brought me in my relationship with the Lord. I’m thankful for the refining it has done in my soul. I’m thankful for how the Lord has it used for great, great good in my life.
This page will be updated as time goes on…
Be sure to send me a note if you have a question — contact me here on my contact page!
