Month: February 2026

How to Give a Gift to the Future

Mid 1980's. Behind the loose rehearsal set for our play, I was stuffing my winter socks into my mother's bra, transforming from my role as the sandwich-board-wearing, singing pig to the obnoxiously-vain queen. I was nervous about my fellow actors watching me put this giant bra on over my t-shirt, and remembered Julie's words from when we'd been swimming at the beach just last summer. She'd been changing into her swimsuit, under the veil of her shirt, and said, "I don't know why I'm shy; I have nothing to hide!"

Julie was my best friend's mother, the cooker of tofu dinners and the owner of fluttery, gentle hands that tucked me into bed on the hundreds of nights I slept in her home. She was the giver of twenty-five cents' allowance to any child who happened to wake up in her home on a Sunday morning, and the offerer of hugs, should any of us need them. When she offered me the role of the pig and the queen in her and Jack's new theatre program, Tir-na-nOg, I accepted because I loved her. I accepted because I knew I'd be safe with her. And I was.

And in the refrain of the play we performed, (yes, of course it's normal for a play to have a refrain!) we sang,

My leaves, they fall, like yellow tears
My leaves, they fall, like yellow tears
My bones, they are bared, to the bite of the wind
I am fading away; I am fading away

…because, collectively, we young performers were a tree, and the wind, and whatever else we needed to be for the beautiful, heart-full, obscurely profound story we were telling to the handful of parents who came to watch us.

Close your eyes, follow me, come and see
Close your eyes, follow me, come and see

The words of this song still permeate my dreams, now that I'm fifty. Now I'm fifty, Jack and Julie's little theatre school has nurtured two generations into adulthood, including my own children. They worked with a local developer to build a space for their dream, and have been operating out of this little space for decades, now. On the east side of the building is a wide open room full of props and costumes, some chairs, and the spirit of so many imaginative group adventures that have echoed off its walls, over the years. It's the space where Jack gathers children's ideas around a story and helps knit them all into an adventuresome script. It's where Julie flits through the developing story, reflecting and celebrating each child's contributions with a kind of joy that infuses the whole room with glittery delight. On the west side of the building, Jack has built a spectacular theatre. It's small, but supremely functional, and his beautiful curved walls, trap doors and secret passageways have inspired much creativity for the children who use them. The set is empowering to children, because it gives them a way to work with their resources and surprise people with ingenuity. Julie paints the set; the backdrops. Julie brings the ephemeral magic to the space. This building, and the nurturing of our children's dreams within it, are a foundation of our community, you might say.

Tir-na-nOg production of the NeverEnding Story, 2013.

Tir-na-nOg isn't just the Land of Perpetual Youth. It's the place where youth is a key to growth. A place where imagination, delight and authenticity play with each other in the spaces between children's faces. And adults'. Because now many children stay with Jack and Julie into adulthood. Some have gone on to very successful careers in the performing arts, but no matter where their life-paths have gone, all have had their lives enriched, their confidence bolstered, and their prospects widened by the lessons they learned at Tir-na-nOg.

My own first child was one of these. Taliesin knew Jack and Julie personally; had played with their grandson in their small apartment above the theatre school, and had gone to see their school's plays multiple times, as well. He wanted SO much to be a part of this magical world. But he was also one of the shyest children I'd ever known, so actually going in to the first day of theatre class proved to be impossible for him. We tried again every week, even taking homeopathic stagefright remedy, arriving before the other children, and more acclimatization visits… to no avail. After six weeks, Jack worried that Taliesin was missing too much of the year's program, and suggested maybe we should wait until the following year. But Tali was determined, and somehow just the sound of Jack's soft gentle voice gave him the confidence he needed, and… he just went in!

A letter with many child's drawings of fairies, a woodcutter, and other characters, along with much decoration. In the child's printing it reads, "thank you for teaching me that I can perform in front of a crowd of people. Performing is easier than I expected. The Story: Do you want to go to acting camp? I'll think about it. (Think, think, think.) He thought about it too long. He missed acting camp!
Taliesin's thank-you letter to Jack and Julie, after his first year at Tir-na-nOg.

That year Taliesin created a non-speaking role for himself, but then started taking on speaking parts, and eventually leading roles with many many lines, that he diligently practised, while also making himself costumes, often with friends who were also in the program. Taliesin went on to create YouTube videos about science topics he was interested in, as well as animations and comedy. He acted in various school plays, but his dream career is not theatre. That doesn't mean the gifts he got from Tir-na-nOg aren't still serving him.

In adulthood, Taliesin became a digital artist, building upon the creativity and confidence nurtured at Tir-na-nOg. And he also ended up working part-time for the H.R. MacMillan Space Centre, while he lived in Vancouver. He became that quintessential inspired science-show-guy, excitedly demonstrating rocket propulsion and other seeming miracles to a crowd of parents and kids! When I went to watch his show, I cried with joy. In the audience that day were a few children, and as he looked out into their eager and shy faces, I saw the same look in his eyes that I know from Jack. He saw them. I mean he really connected with those kids; took their questions at face value and, gently but enthusiastically, made his science show theirs. When he brought up a kid to help him demonstrate, that kid knew he was safe up there on the stage, which is a gift Tali got from Jack and Julie, and now passes on to younger children, as well.

So many of Tir-na-nOg's alumni are spreading Jack and Julie's gifts to the world. Some even still live on the island and are more directly still associated with the school.

Jack and Julie's gift may be spreading into the world, but the fate of the theatre school itself is now in jeopardy. Jack is undergoing treatment for aggressive prostate cancer, and Julie has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's. The fact that they managed to keep the school operating so long with their current troubles is a miracle, indeed, but now they need our help. Our community is fundraising to pay off their building loan, so that the dream of Tir-na-nOg can continue, without their constant personal involvement. Donations can be made at https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-jack-julie

And in our future, may we continue to see our children grow into their confidence. May we continue to see their dreams blossom, and Jack and Julie's gifts spill out into the bigger world. Maybe we continue to hum, as we walk along,

Close your eyes, follow me, come and see
Close your eyes, follow me, come and see

What If We Were Beautiful?

After my dad died, in 2015, my Mum saw me grieving and told me to paint something beautiful. I didn't have it in me, and I painted a whole lot of anger and pain. Sometimes we just have to paint our truth. But… what we create becomes our truth, as well. My mother also told me–countless times throughout my life–that if I wanted to feel happy, I could just make myself smile. That's the last thing you want to hear when you need to be seen and heard; when your experience needs to be acknowledged. But it's also true. And it's been the way I manage the worst experiences life throws at me. I stretch my lips out sideways, rub my cheeks vigorously, and just grin. I fake a laugh until I feel how silly I am, and it becomes real. I paint the most beautiful things I know–the birds and trees and plants and wind and flowers–until their beauty fills up the void left by the pain.

A woman is painting butterflies on the side of a car. The woman has brown hair pulled back in a bun, and is wearing a tank top. She's smiling at the camera, while holding a can of metal paint in one hand, and a paintbrush in the other. The paintbrush is mid-stroke on an orange and black West Coast Lady butterfly wing. Below the butterfly are a green moth and a blue butterfly, and another West Coast Lady butterfly.

When my mother was dying, I painted my car. I covered it with butterflies. "Why?!" People asked me. "Oh the resale value!!" But I did it because beauty. Because the local species of butterflies and moths I painted remind me of a happy day in my garden, and of the butterfly-effect, where small acts of beauty (like painting my car) might in turn create much larger beauty. I painted it because I don't want to live in a world where something as essential to my life as my vehicle is effectively just a gamble against the future, waiting to be re-sold. And I painted it because my mother was dying, and I needed something joyful to do, in between the doom and pain that pervaded our days.

It's not that the pain is really gone, of course, just because we create some beauty. We still need to deal with the horrors of life, and to heal the pain, itself. But at the same time, the world is carrying on around us, and we are contributing to how it grows, whether we're aware of it or not.

Decades of studies have shown us, by now, that the media we consume affects how we experience the world around us. What about what we create? What about how we create? I spent a few years creating social media videos about our local ecology and my nascent regenerative food farm. Making the videos forced me to consider the way I spoke about those things. Editing the videos made me think about how my words would come across to others. Publishing the videos exposed me not only to generally positive feedback from viewers, but also to other videos with similarly nature-celebrating themes that came up in my own feeds.

On the other hand, I've also landed in negative feedback loops, for example when posting my negative political views on our local forum. People fought me, I became angry and argued back, people stated all kinds of further negativity, and generally the conversations devolved, and community bonds broke. I'm not trying to imply that we shouldn't speak up for causes we think are important, but how we do it matters greatly.

What if, instead of calling out harmful things we notice (or in addition to calling them out, if they really need to be stopped imminently), we built the world we want, right alongside the world we don't want, and just lived in that world we want? Would others join us? I think so! Or maybe they'd all be building their own utopias, and one day there would simply be more of us living in joy than in fear and resentment. What if, instead of being ugly with our thoughts, we were beautiful?

It's not possible to be beautiful all the time. Sometimes we just have to curl up in a ball and let the sad times roll over us. But I feel like I come out of such times healthier when I've cultivated enough beauty inside of me that some of it is still there to blossom, when the tears dry up. Then there's more of me to go about building the world I want, by making all life's little choices in line with my vision for a beautiful world.

My mother's gone, now, so I have to summon the memory of her voice in my heart: Emily, make something beautiful. And I, like she, and like you, have to be that voice for ourselves and others. Go make something beautiful. Be beautiful. Find what brings you joy and cultivate it.

Do You Illustrate with AI?

This is not AI. This is a photo of my hand drawing a portrait of three young men, with a reference photo open on my laptop, beside it. So it's a photo of a drawing of a photo! This photo was taken by an artist: me, Emily van Lidth de Jeude. I interviewed the young men and got them laughing together, to create a happy memory from which to draw their portrait. I photographed them during the interview. I then communicated with their family to determine how the final portrait would look. I then drew their portrait, and communicated more with their family to ensure the final product was what they hoped for. Then I sent the portrait to an art printer, who made a print of it, for their grandmother. Then I packaged up the portrait and delivered it. I spent dozens of hours creating this portrait, and the family evidently loves it. Why? Because it's real. It's their children. It shows a real moment of happiness and connection. It shows love. And it's not AI.

This is not AI. This is a photo of my hand drawing a portrait of three young men, with a reference photo open on my laptop, beside it. So it's a photo of a drawing of a photo! This photo was taken by an artist: me, Emily van Lidth de Jeude. I interviewed the young men and got them laughing together, to create a happy memory from which to draw their portrait. I photographed them during the interview. I then communicated with their family to determine how the final portrait would look. I then drew their portrait, and communicated more with their family to ensure the final product was what they hoped for. Then I sent the portrait to an art printer, who made a print of it, for their grandmother. Then I packaged up the portrait and delivered it. I spent dozens of hours creating this portrait, and the family evidently loves it. Why? Because it's real. It's their children. It shows a real moment of happiness and connection. It shows love. And it's not AI.

And now this image is an illustration for a blog post I'm writing, myself. Also not using AI. These thoughts are actually fully my own. These words are they way I think them, in my own mind, and share them with you.

This morning I received a blog post written by a person whose work I admire, illustrated by OpenAI. It's so depressing to see intelligent, thoughtful people write wonderful essays, and illustrate them with AI. As an artist whose work has been scraped, I say 'thanks for nothing'. No pay for our work; not even credit to the artists' work used by the AI.

I'm performing one of my wearable art pieces at the Museum of Vancouver in March and they're pointedly paying me properly for my work, as well as providing human-created promotional material around the event. It shouldn't be amazing to simply be respected and paid for my work, but these days it definitely feels amazing.

Kudos to all the people out there still respecting artists' and writers' work; still seeing our world as a community of creative, resourceful minds, instead of workers on a treadmill run by AI.