Fresh Starts

Donna and I have been extremely anxious this holiday season. There are changes afoot making me act like a hermit crab, waiting until no one looks to move along. We have tackled a couple of simple things and found nagging complications that have been completely out of our control. You had to see our newly hung bedroom curtains to see how a seemingly silly detail could throw us off. One set of panels had been resealed into a bag to make them look new and ready to go...but they had been hemmed a full 24 or more inches! So half of the curtains went to the floor and the other half looked like a poor soul who had rushed out of the restroom with her skirt accidentally tucked in her underpants. Not pretty.

I was fixed on unnecessary details~ that is until I got a synchronous phone call with an art show request. Despite the season and our offers our house will be almost bereft of company and the business where I was to show my work in January and February abruptly closed last week. The end of one opportunity has cleared the way for another. Suddenly the priorities are made clear....new work for the first of the year makes sense. The gifts and galas will sort out as the week progresses. All in good time, all in good time.

Season of Light

We found this silly 7.5 foot narrow tree at Target and I am happy to say the twanging and panging of my old Christmas Tree business days are quieted when I look at the finished tree.  Neither the dog nor I have a rash or the sneezing and wheezing we both do when we bring in a locally grown smells-like-fresh-air just cut Christmas Tree.

The sale on the artificial tree was good enough that we thought it would be worth a try and if we had to abandon it later we would find it a good home. This year there are additional strings of crystals serving as garland~ we purchased them for the arch we were married under this past February and it seems like a perfect new addition to the decor.

We tightened up a little on the decorating this year. I love to paint the rooms with light during these shortest days of the year. I am really all about the pagan parts of the Christmas rituals except that I can sing every hymn related to Christmas as if I am standing in church with my choir robe on and a battery operated candle firmly gripped in my hand. Anything can set the singing off and nothing will drive the melodies out of my head. Without fail I am accidentally (and probably in a quite unwelcome way) serenading my fellow holiday shoppers to the heralding Muzak in the store.

But the light of this season is a hair more dim.The double hit of storms in August and October did nothing to diminish the power bill. How can one be out of electricity for 9 days and not see it any reflected lowering of the utility bill? In the most unnoticeable and useless protest ever I refused to put up the outdoor lights. Yes, I am questioning my seasonal spirit. Grinch? No. Curmudgeon? Yes. Until "Hark to the Bells" puts a skip in my step and a pleasant ringing in my ears. 

At Last...

I can hear Etta James belting the song out in my head...not only because it was what my sister Barbette and her newlywed husband Nathan chose as their first married dance at their wedding, but because it has become my theme song for hope. Please tell me we are hitting the outside edge of the repercussions of the October Surprise snowstorm! Each time I began to put together a newsletter or blog piece about upcoming art events and such I was set back by technical problems. After a 3rd visit in as many weeks by technicians for Cox our internet and phones both seem to be working better and I was able TODAY to finally make some updates to my ArtFire Studio. Our network is finally working so I can print again. All of this AFTER "Black Friday" and "Small Business Saturday". Broad Brook Art missed both of those boats....in port due to storm.

I rely on my computer and other technology objects even more than my art tools, and when I look at the big picture they cost more than my canvas and pencils and such~ although you might be surprised at how often art materials are "updated" or "upgraded" for the better...meaning the old stuff just might not do anymore. That new set of intense pigments I have my eye on? Exorbitant! CUH-razy! We have stayed away from relying on a second car and smart phones for now, but we have found the thrifty choices are not always worth the money OR the time. And ooooh those paints are soooo cool.

For now we will continue our economic insecurity...give me a mild winter and we might yet join the ranks of consumers. First I need to rejoin the ranks of operational business owners. Horse then cart.

Settle in to Monday

Galileo's moon phases

And of course the name is derived from "Moon Day" and countless other references, but considering my penchant lately for the moon and night landscapes I think I will tag this day as my MoonDay.

I haven't sketched a single night landscape since the end of August, when storm Irene robbed us of both daylight and night light...closely followed by storm Lee with torrents of rain. Somewhere in there we headed to a new berth on Cape Cod and found that portion of the Cape was not dog-friendly until October...so we had less night moon on sand, water and beach grasses to look at. I suppose we could have snuck Rosie onto the night beach, but these same places were pretty strict about staying away after sunset as well. I will figure it out~ I must have my dose of moonlit beaches every year.

For years Donna and dog and I have headed off to North Truro for Halloween. This year we knew we couldn't renew the rental. When it was time to place our deposit Donna was still unemployed and we are both grateful she is working now, but common sense told us our lives had changed more than "same time NEXT year". We made a new plan and lo and behold when we would have been moonlighting on national seashore we were digging out from under the storm of the century here at home. 

from THIS October 30, 2011

To THIS November 20, 2011

What is typical for the month between these two photos is my father mowing the back acres one field at a time and the autumn colors creeping into the grasses and glowing gorgeously in the moonlight on my night walks with Rosie. This year relentless weather literally flattened the grasses and the fall colors just greyed out as the snow melted away and the green grasses kept staying spring-like.

And, spring like, there was and still is water water everywhere. Donna and I wondered when we went into as kind of storm coma. After a tense few days we finally figured out Saturday that we had been collectively holding our breath all of November. I had to admit that I had frightened Donna and my folks pretty badly by having the stupid seizure when they had no phone service and couldn't reach 911. Not only did I not want to hear about their experience, I had no interest in discussing the ramifications for me. I was supposed to have the busiest show season EVER. I had a big fat old 50th birthday coming. I also was not interested in a new neurologist and his demands and a new medication and its side effects. Hence my storm coma. I just grayed it all out and moved forward.

During Open Studio we heard some other storm-related traumas. Everyone has at least one story and it is surprising how many of them include explosions. Really. Explosions! As we packed up to head home last Sunday night the block of ice around our experience began rapidly melting into a new edginess. Other people began to speak their continued fears. Did we have any?

Refusing to be inconvenienced is one thing...denial of the facts is quite another. Somewhere my graying field grasses demarcated the line between  staying positive and staying delusional. And delusion is not to be nurtured. So here is my Moonday morning. Reality is shaping up pretty well~ into a new normal. Still here, but a little more real.

What is your Moon Day reality?

Banned from city hall....doesn't stop the art!

Things have been just plain crazy. Part of the reason I haven't written sooner is the world is simply puzzling at the moment, but one thing is straight-forward as can be: if you want to see good art for a good cause you will head over to Manchester Memorial Hospital between 6 and 8 pm tonight and have a gander at the male and female torsos transformed into art to raise breast cancer awareness. Yes, this is the show that was banned from city hall and city hall has realized it is art...not gratuitous nudity. This was a fun thing to do but who knew it would have the power to dissolve an art organization! The real power this "Celebration of the Ta-Tas" show has had is it did EXACTLY what it was supposed to do extremely well~ remind both men and women that regular screenings for breast cancer are essential to the defeat of this disease! And we will have some fun in the meantime...

Full Storm Ahead!

Despite the obstacles we are moving forward. For two days we have had no need to go to a shelter to charge computer or phones and our power has been on consistently and long enough to have caught up on laundry and dishes. The ambulance company tracked us down for billing and my parents now know for sure their oven, coffee maker, surge controls, phones and various lights are blown by the surge that happened when power returned. This time we unplugged our refrigerator (new due to the last big storm) and other expensive appliances and seem to have emerged minus additional power complications. I can still see crews working to restore power down the street and when we drive toward the center of our town the devastation is still too real. School is still not back in session and this is day 6 of 180. With Irene school didn't start on time so most north central schools have already used their allotted snow days and then some...and we are nowhere near the end of winter.

Legislators have been wandering through the public spaces (shelters) and I have received some e-mails that attempt to demonstrate intervention on our behalf. Each local community is allowed to do their own thing, which has left many of us without essential services. Thursday Don and I passed through our municipal buildings and found MREs (meals ready to eat) provided by the National Guard or someone and no plans to distribute those resources to people stranded. I was horrified to pass a house with a grill set up INSIDE the house...sure, the door and windows were open but there have been so many carbon monoxide poisonings (including deaths) that it was hard to believe people would take the risk.

Bottom line? We need some serious distribution of disaster preparedness info...and our communities should be better prepared to inform people of what is going on. I would have gladly gone house to house as a volunteer...I am sure others would have also been willing.

Now the worst is over what was most distressing? The fact that my parents, who happen to live next door, were not willing to leave their home even for a short time. We kept our fireplace going and the temperature near the fireplace was well above 60 degrees...far warmer than the rest of the house and surely far warmer than theirs. Our neighbor with a generator, Justin, was generous and shared his shower facilities as well as electrician information. The electrician is practically a member of the family at this point. He hooked up the old generator to my folks' furnace and pronounced their power and appliances unsafe. I could have done the same thing even as a layperson, but my elderly parents wanted that expert opinion and we were grateful to have it.


Each time we say "lesson learned" but this time...two devastating storms in two months...perhaps we actually have.

Butterflies

I hate self promotion I hate self promotion I hate self promotion! I just sent out an e-mail telling people about Jan Warren's November world and it is making me VERY anxious. Of course the only other option is to not tell anyone and be miserable when there is a poor turn out at my exhibit opening November 3. This show is extremely important to me and I have been running on a very disciplined schedule to be sure it all comes together well.

The butterflies in my belly take me right back to elementary school stage fright. I loved singing with the chorus under Miss Harding's kind tutelage and I remember a concert assembly like it was yesterday. My friend Pam stood up next to me on one of those metal cafeteria chairs so everyone could hear and see her perform a solo. The song still can stick in my head from time to time. I thought she was wonderful but I had butterflies just being next to her! As much as I loved music I did figure out early on that if I had art up on the wall at school I could watch people look at it and hear what they said and never even be seen.

Well, the butterflies in my stomach mean this all is very important to me. Add in turning 50, which I am thrilled to be celebrating. I have always been a little obsessed with the Adirondack Trail and thought I would like to spend my 50th year hiking the entire thing. I committed to artwork instead and of course saw a little snippet in the paper today about a 50 year old woman who had to be rescued from the trail in New Hampshire after breaking her leg. I could just picture that rocky section of the trail and how cold it must be up there right now~ there is a possibility of snow here! Without a doubt I would rather have butterflies and art work than broken bones.

This past weekend I also had a great reminder about how quickly plans can change ~ like shifting winds or breaking a leg ~ so instead of marching in the Hooker Day parade or going to yoga class I got to spend time with Donna and Dad and fix the tractor exhaust to boot. The reminder? Family first. And be prepared. Any procrastination at this point in the game leaves me too vulnerable. If things are done ahead than I can absorb the occasional last minute detour. I am such a procrastinator by habit, staggering between perfectionism and worm tall self assessments. I really have to work to stay in middle ground.

The butterfly here shows every stage from caterpillar to chrysalis to spectacularly winged creature and sometimes I feel like I have to do those stages over and over again...but less now. At 50 it is a little easier to keep my wings intact. So, where are you going to be November 3rd? Did I mention I am having an art show...or three?

Flap flap flap FLAP goes the butterfly.

Damage control

After storm Irene blew through all six of us here on the farm cleaned up what we could of the storm. The days and days of power outage finally exhausted our cooler's abilities to preserve much from the refrigerator. Dad loaded up his generator on the trailer and drove it from Barb's house to their house then on to mine over and over and over. Barb and I each chose one appliance to run and we tried to be sure things were split up accordingly. I still have the top of their wedding cake in my freezer...the one appliance I tried to keep at a workable temperature. I haven't dared look.

I had bushels of garden stuff because I needed to strip the plants before the storm~ the biggest single day harvest of the year. Donna and I drove down to the grocery store to get what was needed to preserve all this fresh-picked bounty. As we got to the parking lot a torrential rain beat down on us. Irene was still 12-16 hours away from impacting us at all and we were already seeing flooding. Slowly the gravity of our situation dawned as we sat there in the car, knowing the already saturated ground would partner with the coming wind to create a disaster on a level we had never seen. Donna started up the engine and we slowly drove home without ever having entered the grocery store. I have to admit to stopping by the liquor store.

 I can't remember when exactly my Aunt Barbara came to my rescue. If she hadn't taken my harvest off my hands completely it would have all rotted along with the contents of the refrigerator. And she is such a love...Barbara has the same passion we do for the fresh picked. I knew nothing would go to waste. It wasn't much considering the disappointing growing season, but it was all we had and I couldn't bear to see it wasted.

24 hours before Irene made landfall

24 hours after

It took a while for the full extent of the damage to reveal itself. You could look into a stand of trees and  leaves from broken branches and fallen trees blended right in, as long as they were green. As days went by all the broken started to reveal itself. Nathan bought himself a chainsaw and all of us worked to clear the paths. As more and more limbs were piled to the sides we realized the log splitter needed to be revved up...but no luck getting it going. The heavy heavy snow brought rodents into engines and air filters to take shelter. It was impossible to get into the shed or under tarps to check on things with a 36 inch snowpack. The tropical storms came on the heels of our earthquake. I am not sure I was joking when I said to people locusts would be next.

I haven't written about it or posted photos because so many people were hurt worse than us. Agriculture in our area took a double hit as record snow reduced sheds, garages and barns to jumbled piles of tinder. It is still hard to look at the twisted carcasses of our neighbors greenhouses. One family we know simply packed it in: put their retail location up for sale and left the ruined greenhouses as testimony to powerlessness. And all of that was months before record September flooding wiped out millions in crops along the CT river and deeply inland.

A month and a half later and we can't get equipment across the bridge over the brook without becoming completely mired. We had 3 1/2" more rain here last week and expect another inch or so today. Like I said, so many people suffered losses that the insult to our household shouldn't be whined about. We slipped away to South Dennis on Cape Cod and had a fabulous week...then came home to a post-storm newly restocked refrigerator with an internal temperature of 80 degrees! Two days of research and comparison pricing led us to Lowe's and a solid price on fridges with newer features. Next day delivery was exactly as promised although I did not account for the baseboard trim or the cabinet being just 1/8" off plumb. For the first few days it hung out into the kitchen while I DARED it to fail. It took about a week to really feel we could invest in cold food again. For a while I tried to wrap my brain around the idea that the loss of the refrigerator guaranteed it would be a while before we purchase that second car.

2011 has been quite a ride for this family so far...unemployed, snowed in, Dad ill, married, dug out, re-employed, Dad better, sister married, rained out then to ice it soon I will be turning 50. Not bad. Not bad at all. I really am happier than I have ever been!

Time Travel?

I wonder more and more how time can pass so quickly. I seems like we just finished dealing with storms Irene and Lee from late August and early September and it is past mid October now! The morning glories are giving us one last big show until a hard frost does them in. The garden was almost hopeless this year because wet weather spread more kinds of plant fungus than I have ever seen and I certainly have come across mushrooms I am sure I haven't encountered before. Time did crawl to a stop at one point...all those days the power was out.

Garden nightmare: tomato fungus everywhere

 The fall garden wasn't worth photographing. It is just a big patch of dirt with a sprout or two of red lettuce and a sorrowful row of radishes that simply won't fill out. Once we pulled out the tomato plants the marigolds revealed their glory. My one good idea was to put those between the tomatoes. It kept it from looking completely like death.

It still does seem like the sky looks like this more often than not...and the one-two punch of Irene and Lee added a few permanent fixtures to our lives.

Sand bags and pick up sticks! Oh and we can't forget the must-have fashion item for October! Donna and I drove up to Tolland, MA to help my uncle out with his internet connection. I was going crazy trying to figure out what smelled so offensive in the car...then in the house...the scent was following me around. I was horrified to narrow the nauseating reak down to me, the only common denominator. Before I was revealed as the source of the odor  I tiptoed outside, double-bagged the shoes I was wearing and stashed them in the van to throw out when I got home. My shoes had simply not dried completely in several weeks and finally they were going to rot right at the end of my leg. L.L. Bean here we come. These wellies have been used EVERY SINGLE DAY since their purchase. I feel like I am going fishing instead of walking the dog...but at least my feet are finally dry!

Wow~ great month, good show!

I was grateful to fall into a one-woman show as artist-of-the-month at Aetna, here in Hartford CT. Lots of people in our geographical area have been employed by some big companies, but not me...so the whole place seems HUGE! I have come and gone through the loading dock a number of times and the conduit for cold drinking water has to have a 3 foot radius. But stuff is selling nicely and people there have been so great. I hadn't advertised two of the pieces anywhere else because they are so new...and now they are going to live with someone else! I couldn't be happier!

Morning Mayhem

I have no one to blame but myself. I have suddenly moved from garden maintenance straight into full harvest and I don't own any canning jars! I am pretty sure my mom will share her equipment, perhaps even pass it on. After 50 years of gardening and canning the folks are just about finished. But that doesn't mean there isn't commentary. Moments ago I heard my father's farm cart pull away from the front step...and there it was...

Drive by squashing

I took the pup out for our morning stroll yesterday and caught the man circling quietly about the compound. He warned me I had cucumbers to harvest. It seemed impossible. Perhaps there is one, I thought, but I was so very wrong. 10 more for our house and 7 for Mom. The father was not mistaken. I believe I have underestimated the capacity here.

Over the weekend Donna and I caught up to the garden...or tried to. It took a lawnmower and much hand weeding to get us back into shape after weeks of heat and no rain and other priorities. I was sure I had harvested well enough to skip a day. But no...we are to the point of daily harvest. At last!!! The moment I was anticipating since March! And how could I have been so unprepared?

I pictured how the days of August would be. I would roll out of bed ready to face the day. First, get Rosie out. Let her run around pretty well and then we would pitter patter around the garden selecting succulent veggies for a gourmet supper. The way I love it...breakfast from the tomato vine. Back to work in the studio all day and another walk before making dinner...cut through the garden gate and just brush against the tomato vines and the basil...pick some flowers for the table.

Okay. I know no one but me is surprised how different reality is. This is the actual way the day has gone:

Get up early to shower.

Take the dog out to pee before the trip to camp...doggy day care.

The dog won't pee. If she holds it maybe I won't leave.

I take her back inside.

I rifle through all my various bags for keys, grocery lists, coupons.

This is the activity that tipped off the dog of my imminent departure. 

Again!  I have allowed the cell phone to die without charging.

Borrow Donna's phone for the day.

Drive dog to camp.

Drive Donna to work because in order to be environmentally responsible AND avoid a car payment we have become a one car family.

Drop my darling off and head to Hartford.

The inevitable traffic.

I pick up my friend Cathleen and we head to Whole Foods to shop and have breakfast.

I find MORE than what I need at Whole Foods. A $9.99 vanilla bean? One bean? Really?

Cathleen and I sit down to eat and we can't have a conversation...

there is a raucous meeting of men behind us and we are both hard of hearing.

Load up groceries and head to a store that has a coupon and sale on frames.

Wander around calculating, finally putting some in the cart.

Helpfully pull things together for the cashier while I should have been searching for my credit card.

Watch the line become absurdly long for 9:00 a.m.

Give up the search. Pay cash.

Hit the bank for cash...not sure if the bank HAS cash after this week on Wall St..

As I drop Cathleen back at ArtSpace an alarm sounds.

In my car.

????Low fuel? I have never seen that giant orange square before...and did I mention the alarm?

Ha! I can beat those high gas prices with my Stop & Shop gas rewards!

Drive 10 miles to Stop & Shop gas station.

Wait a long time in line.

Get to the pump and find I do not have the new fancy purple card that gives the gas rewards.

And then there is the alarm...and the line.

Pump 5 gallons and called it a fill up.

Go to grocery store for items that were too pricey in Whole Foods,

stuff I need to put up crops from the garden.

Scan and bag my own groceries as I go and head to the self-check-out lane.

(In high school I got paid to check groceries)

Coupon dealy-doo keeps yelling "coupons full"

Does anyone else in the store find that

know-it-all talking witch of a cash register speaks very loud?

Live cashier helps but not without a subtle but unmistakable 

adults-are-SO-stupid eye roll.

The woman in the machine insists I slide a coupon into the slot...

A coupon that is in fact IN the slot.

The woman in the machine takes back my discount, only it seems she is more quiet with the stealing-my-money part.

Try to catch the eye of eye-roll girl.

Race out of the store and throw everything in the car...I have frozen stuff...gotta beat this sun...

Look for the receipt and realize in my haste I must have left it in the store.

Head back in...and slowly realize I do not have a receipt because

I LEFT WITHOUT PAYING!!!!!

Run faster, searching for cops or other authorities mobilizing.

Think about my defense...

Skulk into the check-out lane and find the woman in the machine has not stopped talking to me,

despite the fact I was long gone. This is now a good thing.

Finish and pay, retrieving the receipt that PROVES I saved $17 in coupons

and quietly exit the store.

As I am getting in the car I look at my "gas rewards" total.

They have started my gas rewards over again. 

I have no gas rewards.

Head home, unload groceries.

Look down and find frozen fruit pop melted 

in pink blotches all over my new white shirt.

Soak the shirt...

And here I am. I am not making art. I am not pickling cucumbers and making cucumber soup. I am not walking the dog or strolling through the garden. In fact I am actually paying someone else to wear the dog down. I haven't started dinner. When I am through here I think I will have spent a good chunk of my afternoon whining on a blog no one will ever read again if I DON"T MAKE SOME ART and get it up here. And in a little bit I will head out to pick up my sweet wife from work and my sweet dog from camp.

But life is good. My sweet dog is always glad to see me. My sweet wife never, ever says "whatever did you do with your day??!!" and she likes it when the three of us stroll through the garden together and she never minds when dinner is late and she is happy to help cook and still clean up. It could be so much worse....the woman in the register could have been my only friend today...but I had Cathleen and Jane and sunshine with lower humidity and rain for the garden last night.

Sure, I am behind in work and chores...but what good is growing stuff if I don't stop and drink it all in?

Installed at Aetna

There is a gallery space outside the cafeteria on Aetna's Hartford campus. Artists selected have a month to show their work and give a gallery talk at the end of that month. I took 23 pieces and hung 20 because that is how many cables there were to the hanging system~ a typical rail with hanging wires system.

Hopefully I can get some feedback about two new pieces I made in late July. I love mixed media and collage but I rarely include those pieces in shows. After the hydrangea-all-over-everything for Barb and Nate's wedding I was burnt and bored with plain old drawing. I made myself a challenge: new pieces that fit in a #10 envelope...you know, regular business size. I have a ton of odd envelopes hanging around, gluing themselves closed over time. The idea was to send thank you notes but...I liked one of the pieces too much to send away! 

There are a number of pieces in the Aetna gallery I have not shown before. August 21 I am participating in a plein air painting event at Valley Falls in Vernon. I haven't painted outside with anyone else in a while and I am wondering if I should get on my horse (so to speak) right now and join the Tolland County Artists' Association Tuesday Painters. They won't be too far from here and I can figure out if my approach to outdoor art will be too bizarre. The Valley Falls area is near and dear to my heart and I want to be sure to make something there that will sell~ a portion of the proceeds go to the Friends of Valley Falls.

All right. With just a few chances at a dry run with other painters I had best get my shy self over there. We will see how it goes...

And the summer flies~ literally!

I was ripping about yesterday, tearing from meetings to ta ta pick up to conservation commission. I left the car running for a second and flew inside for some paperwork and when I got back out waiting on my door handle was this dude...

 It should have been complete with the theme from the Jaws movie. All right, so I exaggerate a bit. The blue color was brilliant and this time of year you can observe all the colors of summer, from the flowers and fruits to the buggers that bugger them.

I can't remember a worse year for biting insects of all kinds. I am a great nature girl...every creature has a place and purpose...and then I am STUNG again!  Farm wide there have been plenty of wasp stings, hornet infestations and then the monster mosquito population. I even stumbled on an underground nest in the back of my compost pile. Well, I didn't stumble on it...I accidentally dug the top right off of it. Rosie and I lucked out on that one. I saw them before they saw me. What an exercise motivator...RUN!!!!!  

I need to get back to work but it proved to me one can find a motivation to use color in art in all of those moments. That blue iridescence on my blue door made it so clear. Observe and run...observe and run! 

Family Medical Leave from art?

Few folks know my Dad had a turn in health in December and now here it is June 7. Time crawls when a diagnosis can't be nailed down clearly...and flies toward my sister's wedding date (July 9). I am of that age group that has aging parents and that is all there is too it. What was simple becomes more complex...I had to stop ignoring the phone during my work hours. Dad has had two serious health crises that required hospitalization and the establishment of a team of specialists.

One of his symptoms was rapidly deteriorating mental status~ dementia ~ that did largely reverse with the right medical treatment. I felt strongly this was not Alzheimer's...there is no family history, he had a sudden onset of symptoms and a very rapid progression. In December he was sometimes confused, by mid-March he woke and had deteriorated so severely he could not speak, his body overtaken by severe tremors. A hospital admit at that point was absolutely essential and someone finally asked the right questions and got the right answers to those questions. He was treated for hepatic encephalopathy and over the next several weeks his symptoms faded. In May he developed an internal bleed that also took a few days hospitalization to nail down.

Over the months I repeatedly asked myself if my close following of my parents' health was necessary...and each time the answer was yes. I would have taken family medical leave or some other time off from any other job and I felt strongly something was being overlooked. My sister had a major surgery this Spring and there is just the two of us. Being self-employed I have a flexibility she does not when teaching. It is just near impossible to take a leave from your own business without destroying all that has been built. And now Dad is more stable it is time to focus on Broad Brook Art...but I believe there is a degenerating condition underlying these health crises and it may pull us all in again sooner than later. Everything is fine...until it isn't.

Night Landscape#1 in metallic acrylics

NL #3 in metallic paint

Night Landscape #2 in pastel

So I have been painting night landscapes with Lumiere acrylics. Despite knowing the paint's metallic appearance can't be duplicated online or in giclee prints. I just wanted to do SOMETHING. I wondered if I would be better off with pastel to get what I was looking for...so on to pastels for a moment. They also come in metallic shimmery shades, but I don't have a huge selection.

 For me the paint transforms the color in a different way and building layers comes easily. I started on night landscapes when we stayed in North Truro on Cape Cod. The beach grasses and fences shoring up the dunes  catch what little light there is, highlighted an instant at a time by the Highland Light lighthouse. Then the sweeping light is gone and in fills the void with a sparkling darkness that is the ocean. I love walking there at all times of the day, but the night sometimes seems mine alone.

Here our night landscape is starting to be transformed by fireflies. I am going to try and video some of that this year. I have never found a good way to make art from all those moving, searching points of light but this time of year marks when I first fell in love with landscape in the night.

Lots O' Speculation/ Reflection...big words for not so much. In the meantime I made myself finish this: 

Fawn Moon                     color pencil

I am pretty sure I won't stop at the four seasons...Rabbit Moon is summer, Crow Moon is autumn, Fawn Moon is RIGHT NOW Spring. Now my fox hunting on moonlit snow needs final touches.

Back to work...the fight is not allowing every day dramas to drag me away from artmaking.

January records

Deep snow

Snow was still falling Wednesday, January 12th, when we headed out to try and clear things up a bit. Donna is keeping warm while shoveling in her dayglow orange coat. Late Wednesday was clean-up from the two feet of snow. There was 22 + inches at Bradley Field, south and west of here. The "shallowest" snow in a trough formed by the wind was 16 inches.

Yesterday we strapped on snowshoes and made our best effort to create some new paths for Rosie. The video doesn't show her making her own paths, diving like a dolphin. In the paths Donna and I created she blazes around, looking for all the world like a racehorse on a track...and running out of track fast.

Each time we go out all we can say is "AMAZING". Trees look shorter~ I look shorter...how can that be? Oh cruel world!

To Fall From the Sky

There have been several incidents of birds simply falling dead from the sky in mass quantities, thousands at a time. Fish and crabs are also affected...creating a disturbing series of events, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8244044/Bird-deaths-timeline-of-the-mysterious-bird-deaths.html

events and news that are now eclipsed by the Arizona shooting tragedy. That is as it should be but it all feels just a bit apocalyptic. It leaves a queasy feeling in my belly...what is to be done?

In the same vein there was a news clip of a meeting between officials in Louisiana and one man was shouting that they had gone easy on the fish and game people, refraining from releasing photos of how bad things still are in the heavily oiled coastal areas. Since I am cataloguing images for use in artwork about the oil spill I know there are more photos to be had. I have no doubt some are not being published and it isn't for the good of the public.

I hate to be paranoid, but who can be trusted to monitor these wildlife and environmental knowns and unknowns? With deadly events spread across multiple US states and even to other countries, no one thing can explain it all. After the bird deaths I saw an environmentalist interviewed on the Today show. He made us all look like idiots, raving that animals are dying everywhere and quoting statistics for manatees dying in the Florida cold. Yes, he was correct, but he didn't come close to answering questions or making observations regarding the bird deaths.

Bird falling dead from the sky resonates in some dark way. Mass kills happen in natural ways...lightning and hail for example...what kind of natural disaster kills fish AND crabs AND birds in seperate mass incidents? I await scientific answers.

As for another headline: Arizona Talk Radio Hosts Deny Responsibility
I lived in Arizona when the new kind of rabid talk radio was born there and the heated rhetoric always sounded like a call to arms. I think any strong pacifist or champion of free speech would find the airwaves out there challenging and someone with a distorted fear or hatred could be fueled to violence. To me only true thing is that readily available firearms increase the likelihood of deadly tragedies.

Other frightening news this month, seperate incidents of alteration...the erasing of words from classic literature and the airbrushing of historic images. One was rendered by an "authority" on Mark Twain and the other museum mounting a show with World War II photos.

Curiouser and curiouser...

January Thaw

It has been too long since I sat down to write. It was a good Fall/Holiday season, getting work out and getting around with it. It is time for all those January chores but there are some good bonus activities...new art shows and wedding planning. Then not so great new activities...Donna's job search and wrangling with the former employer. Sustained cold here has meant indoor nesting, but we get out with the pup and our snowshoes, a gift last Christmas, are finally getting some use this year. In fact, it was possible to snowshoe all but two days since the December 26 blizzard. Snow falls and stays, unusual in the last couple of years.

My thaw isn't the temperature, it is a melting of the casing that seems to envelope my brain when the holidays are past and winter is totally set in. There is new work and a new office in which Donna and I can work together. We yanked out our old desks, which nearly filled the room. Instead we put together a couple of Ikea pieces and refashioned an 8 foot countertop along one wall for us both to pull up to the computers. For the first time we have an event calendar we both share. THAT has never happened in the 7 years we have been together! An Ikea sofa table is serving as an office credenza and we have more bins and baskets for storing stuff than ever before. The whole thing is painted a Sea Sage green and the room is far more calming than before, especially with Rosie curled up in my grandmother's old pink chair behind us.



8 X 10" scratchboard in progress



sketched first

I have to be honest and own up that I have let Donna's working from home interfere with my art-making productivity. It is too easy to keep tapping away on the computer next to her and less easy to tear away and make work, which has put me a bit behind for a late January show. I have a new Gulf Oil Spill work in progress although these are just for art sake, I am not quite sure if anyone will want to own one!

It always seems that when it comes to distractions the art-making is the biggest loser, the easiest to derail. When I was working here by myself I simply put on my headphones and went for 5 or 6 hours at a time. I ignored the phone and the door and anything else that got in the way. Anyone who is self-employed understands there is far more to earning a living than simply producing whatever it is you sell. Sometimes I look up from my morning e-mail it is nearly noon. Time to start setting a timer to be sure I move away from the computer.

But the computer led me to a very cool person just this Saturday. Just in one phone conversation, after some rapidly exchanged e-mails, helped us pull in to focus a whole different project~ a delicious distraction if there ever was one! So I am off to manage multiple priorities. All right, truth told, ATTEMPT to manage...