Recently, at my DayJob, we’ve started to get emails about how far children are behind compared to themselves, or others, pre-pandemic. Test scores are being compared, and conclusions drawn.

Meanwhile, I’m left wondering, what about the adults? Those in the lives of these kids, but also the rest of the world *waves about* who went through the pandemic.

I know that I have been forever changed. The pandemic was not kind to therapists and behavioral healthcare in general. Hell, I’d say that everyone in a helping profession was impacted in a way that will stick around. We might be forever changed, only the next gen will not feel this. Or maybe they will in the same way I was impacted by my grandparents living through the tail end of the Great Depression.

Professionally, academically, we call this generational trauma. See also: vicarious trauma.

We pass it down.

​I see this in my art studio. 

The ugly middle stage of an art work is leaving kids frustrated and rushing through a piece instead of their more normal careful plod. Tears are more usual than ever. Fixing becomes frantic, and when it doesn’t work the first time. End game.

Meanwhile, I make a wonky sketch of a car or a truck. It doesn’t really look like that truck- another intimidating mass of blocks and sharp points, mashed together and coated in black, gray or white. I paint it in pink for giggles.

Through this all I wonder how it is that art has saved me from the same frustrations. Sure I work with kids but I see the frustration on instagram, on YT on videos made by new creators and in my comments, and also on posts made to other social media sites- the frustration is under the surface for adults too, we just do a better job masking it. Giving up is right there at our fingertips.

But in my art, I am able to push through, tolerate the mistake and ugly middle. I know that if I think a spot sucks I can scrape it down and build it back up. I know what to do when a painting turns to shit.

scrape it down

build it back up

It’s a metaphor for life.

I chose to sink into the art. The art process. The Making of art. The keeping of a sketchbook and a journal. For now my Every Thing Every Where Journal is in 2 pieces and my sketchbook is on loose postcard shaped paper. Sometimes based on experience is necessary.

Postcard and pocket notebooks. I’ve been here before.

I fear there’s more lurking to this change. There will be more research that will uncover more issues. Still I’ll think, “what about adults? where are we?”