Greetings from coastal Maine in almost mid-February! What this means is, the weather patterns are starting to change. It is yet another dreary weekend, weather wise, outside my windows. Most of the landscape consists of gray skies, snow that's dull in color due to getting watered down by rain drops, or the fact that they're dirty snow banks, and darkened soaked bare trees. You can tell Spring is just over a month away. It's not the prettiest time of year and this is one reason why so many people from northern New England take their vacations and go to warmer, sunnier climates. Mid to late winter fever is starting to set in who are still here. This is especially true when my two oldest grandkids came over to visit for a short spell.
While I know kids will be kids, and being brother and sister does not help. They are 12 and 11 and getting very good at it. There must be some unwritten, innate law, where brothers and sisters MUST get on each others nerves that has been passed down through the generations. It happened with my brother and I, and it happened with my Mom and her sisters. Sometimes however, we as adults can't escape the occasional bickering, complaining, or bitching. For example, my husband Dave and I played a rousing game of Life with the grand-kiddos. For the um-teenth time, Dave picked the card where he purchases a snail farm for the tidy sum of $50,000 dollars while exclaiming that the game was rigged in some way. The tension mounted as everyone except my grand-daughter was sued by another player, whether it was vandalizing one's fence or smashing another persons prized tomatoes. After a few hours of that and other visiting, I was exhausted! Life whether the game or for real - is indeed exhausting at times. Sometimes I feel the art world can hold the same.
If "life is what you make it", then interesting is the key word. I began Monday creating three more 8x10 inch oil paintings. I managed to complete one of the works, while the other two are in progress (and they still are). The second still had a perspective flaw and the third had a poor color choice for the water; it became too green for my liking. No matter what I did to those two paintings on Tuesday, I couldn't get either one to "behave", so I put them aside. By the next day, I had to pack my supplies away because I was going to be away for the next two days. By the time I returned, it was practically the weekend, visiting all four of my grandkids, as well as other friends stopping by for a visit. As a result, my paintings are having ample time to dry. If I venture into my studio and sit on the sofa I have there, the paintings can also taunt me because they are not only unfinished, but they also know I don't have the time to seriously work on them. If anyone believes the artists life is easy, then they are not an artist or doing it solo with no other income or both.
However, this weekend was not a total loss, by any means. I made life what it was meant to be; seeing family and friends, going out on Saturday night with Dave to a coffee shop and seeing a cool, local band, cooking up a storm with him in our smallish kitchen, submitting our book to four more publishers in New York, or hitting up yet another gallery in hopes in displaying my works. Of course, Dave mentioned yet again that we need to open up our own gallery in either Rockland or Camden where there's lots of foot traffic and tourists. I know he's right - we both feel it in our hearts. We just need the right place at the right time. Ten to fifteen years ago, we would've both rushed into an endeavor like that head first and then wondering why 12 months later it failed. Today, we know better and it will come to pass... they way it's meant to be.
Until next time,
Jill
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