Evie James

A Beginning

The Shape of Shelter

Most love stories start with a man. Mine starts with a house called Pebblestone, a Rottweiler with boundary issues, and two small boys who think I’m indestructible. It starts with me. A woman who has weathered enough storms to know better than to romanticise them, standing in the wreckage of a life that didn’t go to plan. It starts with me deciding, quietly, not to lie down in it. There are no fairytales here. Only saltwater and petrol fumes. A kitchen bench stacked with panc

This is an unfolding body of work, offered one artwork at a time.
This is one place to begin. From here, follow what draws you, and explore the rest intuitively...

Author's Note

The Gypsy

Avalon

The Edge of The World

Where Dragons Are Born

Pebblestone

The Shape of Shelter

If you've ever...

Lost pieces of yourself and rebuilt them by hand.
Not the polished version.
The real one.

Held everything together alone.
The long nights.
The laughter.
The tears.

Found the will to keep loving anyway.

Because we all walk through fire and water.
And we all find air in the end.

...then this story is for you.

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Raw, rushed, unfinished, ugly…
Sometimes these are the most honest ones.

Fading in and out. Im hiding, but im here.

Sometimes the bravest part is stopping, staying, being still

Somewhere underneath the grief,
there’s still a quiet place.
It feels a little like this.
And I’m learning to let myself spend time there.

Lord I’m Tired but I’m Still Here

Grief is a knife with no handle.
There is no real end to it.
It’s not something you complete, or finish, or get over.

You have to learn to live with it inside you.

You grow around it.
But never through it.

And the grief of suicide has poison on the tip.

Because it comes tangled with anger and guilt.

Anger at him for choosing to end his life.
Guilt for not being able to save him.
Anger at feeling such guilt for something was not mine to fix.
Guilt at feeling such anger for someone who was in too much pain.

Around it goes in an endless loop.

It’s messy.
Awful.
Mixed with a helpless kind of agony because none of it can ever be fixed.

Today would have been his birthday.

And I still don’t know if I’m ready to talk about this.

But I can’t keep holding it all inside my chest anymore.

Because I’m left carrying this alone.

So I’m letting the page hold some of it, so it doesn’t crush me with its weight.

He might be at rest.
But the ones he left behind are not.

Sometimes I wonder if he can feel our mourning for him, if it helps him know his life mattered.
That he was unforgettable.
That he was significant.

His was one of the most beautiful friendships of my life.

The first time I truly felt settled at Pebblestone.

A neighbour who helped change the tyre on my son’s bike.
Someone I could take scraps to for his chickens and get eggs in return.
Our kids playing together in the yard, at the beach, out camping.

It was grounding.
I felt like I belonged.

A rare thing for me.

A safe harbour.

And I’m so grateful for having that, while he was here.

So, happy birthday love.

Thank you for sharing your light while you could 🤍

Pebblestone was not my dream house.
It was the house I had left.

Or at least, the house I would have left, if leaving had been an option.

A life held together with all my strength, faith, and a will that had shown it would not break.

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Evie James

A Beginning

The Shape of Shelter

This is an unfolding body of work, offered one artwork at a time. This is one place to begin. From here, follow what draws you, and explore the rest intuitively...

Author's Note

The Gypsy

Avalon

The Edge of The World

Where Dragons Are Born

Pebblestone

The Shape of Shelter

If you've ever...

​

Follow my Art

This is an unfolding body of work, offered one artwork at a time.
This is one place to begin. From here, follow what draws you, and explore the rest intuitively...