Tuesday, September 30, 2008

As Promised - the Stray Cat Strut Mandala

Gosh, has it already been two months? I think I posted at the end of July or beginning of August that I wanted to create a mandala entitled the Stray Cat Strut. I drafted out a design shortly thereafter, but I haven't taken the time to create the final version. (Partly, I lost the compass I'd bought in early July; I can't find it anywhere. Finally bought a new one last week.)

I finally took the time to create it last Sunday afternoon. Voila!



This is an abstract skeleton - there's the main blue t-shape that represents my arms, spines, and the beginnings of my legs at the bottom. Blue represents calmness, serenity, healing, and strength to me. There is a cat (looking at it from above) about mid-way down my spine. This cat is cruising through my bones, swishing out cancer with its tail. The cancer is represented by red - which is related to the anger that I was trying to release after I colored "Slow Burn". As you can see, the arms and top part of the spine have no red in them. There is red that's been knocked out of the arms and the spine, floating outside my body in a pool of healing blue. The cat has just flicked its tail to knock out another red cancer area. The bottom part of my spine and my legs are more purplish in color - this represents a mixing of healing blue and red cancer. Healing blue is already there since I've been on anti-tumor meds since February, but it hasn't quite conquered the red cancer - since my CT scan still showed calcium deposits in my bone marrow. My body and the knocked-out cancer cells are surrounded by a yellow, healing light, which then begins to radiate outward in the orange.

I'll be the first to admit that I can't draw well, but I think that the colors work very well, overall, even if I do say so myself. I plan to post this somewhere in my house and a copy in my office so that I can remember to take a few minutes to visualize this Stray Cat knocking out the cancer in my bones. (Remember, I first got the idea of using the song, Stray Cat Strut, to visualize knocking out cancer when I heard the song while laying on the radiation table.)

There you have it, folks. Enjoy!

3 comments:

Carver said...

That turned out great Dee. I haven't been coloring mandalas lately but maybe you'll inspire me. I do enjoy it.

MisAnthropology said...

Very cool. I think it's incredible the way people turn to art in situations like this -- this piece, my aunt's quilt, heck, even my father painted one heck of a powerful piece as a young man when he was recovering from having his wisdom teeth pulled out. It's fascinating.

Nice job. You draw just fine.

Dee said...

Hi Carver and Mary,
Thanks for the compliment! I think my Stray Cat Strut visualization might be working! My tumor markers were even lower in September than in August! I will post about this next!
Dee