Christmas ADVENTures

These ADVENTures grew from the stress and uncertainty of THE GREAT PANDEMIC OF 2019, when many of us around the world were furloughed or laid-off from jobs, hunkering down, isolating, or quarantining within our communities to avoid catching or spreading COVID-19.

When return-to-work with limitations started at the end of 2020, those who didn't lost jobs permanently at that time faced the domino-effect of what shutting down production for months does to running a business: closed vendors, parts shortages, logistics nightmares, and HR challenges.

These ADVENTures became my personal creative container to transmute the helpless, gnawing energy of the times into action and humor, which soon took on a life of its own, spinning a straw narrative into a golden story reflecting planning and scheduling chaos, employment changes, and other imperfections that arise in the thick of it all, discovering lessons throughout the absurdity.

The initial 25 ADVENTures were written in real-time to sync with Christmas Advent, and dispatched through the eScriber newsletter (retired) a-day-at-a-time with the serendipitous emergence of a new character, the tarotble, pseudonymous card reader: Madam Bedazzle. This piece-work was then buttoned up into a book and later accompanied with cornier videos. Now it's in the process of being refined into Web site installations nearly five years in.

Yes, this body of work has grown legs and keeps evolving as the epitome of the artist entering into, and gaining nourishment from, engaging in creative process. When one creative act turns into a series spanning an entire performance, we've found our place in the play of life. Keep playing! —Chris Dunmire, August 3, 2025

Chris Dunmire is an imaginative being and humorist and the driving force behind the Creativity Portal web site. …