Hey there seventeen going on eighteen. It's me, thirty five going on thirty six.

I was thirty five this last year.  Quickly coming up on thirty six.  I love certain numbers for no particular reason and thirty six is one of those numbers.

I don't like odd numbers as much. Odd years, etc.  Ek.

I may be a bit superstitious.  You are too.

This year is going to be awesome.  In celebration of it's arrival, I went digging around through the two bins that contain EVERYTHING about me pre-twenty four and found the below piece of work (photos below).  I am grinning holding it and under my breath I mumbled,

'Hey there seventeen going on eighteen.  It's me, thirty five going on thirty six'.

I swear I could feel my younger self glancing up as I drew it back then in that tiny bedroom I rented from that older older lady that summer.

I remember wondering a lot, back then, if I would ever start writing songs again, or when I would again play the flute or pick up poetry. My 'voice' had been silenced for over a year at that time.

No, I didn't. I haven't written a song since it was extinguished. I am so sorry seventeen almost eighteen, I never could find that voice again.

But I found a new voice.

And I really really wish that some how I could reach back and touch your hand and tell you it's going to be a hell of a lot better than all right.

Thank you for this little piece of the past I forgot I had kept.  I burned, literally, so much  I forget what photos and pieces survived the purge of twenty two.  I remember why I saved this one, it was the quote on one side and the poem on the other.

I have thought about that quote every single time I made a friend who turned out to be a kindred spirit. And it has always, for nearly twenty years, been absolutely true.

"For true partnership is achieved only by separate and whole persons who retain their separateness even as they unite."

And then that poem... I was a mess at this time but in a moment of clarity that night I wrote it as a declaration, as a promise.

I believe that words have weight.  I believe that by putting emotions, promises, premonitions; into words, into shapes, colors - I believe that act binds one to them.  So maybe this battered piece of cardboard, the only canvas I could have afforded at the time, sketched with a sharpie and watered down nail polish, bound me to the future I live in now.

And that is awesome.

 

Walla Walla Vineyards (Original Art)

20" X 24" 1.5" 

Oil Pastel on Acrylic

New work in progress. Time to pay a little homage to gorgeous Walla Walla, WA

Softened Sandpaper

I was old and you were old and the world so different we didn’t recognize it.  I dreamed your hand felt like warm softened sand paper and my bones felt light and fragile as a bird’s.

We were smiling, with our exhausted faces.

And then I woke up in this dry desert of a state with the smell of rain and green things in my inhale. 

My body is still strong, albeit a few pounds over ideal, and I thought about that quote I always seem to think about, “What makes life so bitter sweet that it will never come again”.  I am para-phasing, it’s an Eleanor Roosevelt one.

Remember when you worried aloud, early on, that we had so little in common? I, the day dreamer, the artist, the wanderer.  You, the thinker, the problem solver, the adventurer.

And I laughed and said I gloried in it.  The gorgeous, strange kaleidoscope of you and I.  And a little skeptical, a little bemused, you have held my hand and haven’t let go any more than I ever could of yours.

Ah our manic battles, our compromises, the raging tantrums, the astounding grace of the story that is this of you and I.

Landscapes - A Group Art Show (Hosted by Mod a-go-go)

I am excited to say my 'Autumn Rain' and 'A Walk in a Dream' will be included in Mod a-go-go's Landscape group show starting this Friday, February 19th and going through March 13th. :)

(**I love and welcome the compliment of a purchase request)

She called Your Name (Original Work)

'She called Your Name'

20" X 20" X 1.5"

(Acrylic, Oil Pastels)

Details

(**I love and welcome the compliment of a purchase request.  Depending on the piece, I charge $.75 to $1.00 per square inch)