Big impact from tiny things

You know that phrase, “ I need a [fill in the blank] like I need a hole in the head”? Turns out I ACTUALLY needed a hole in my head and I am using that as an excuse for EVERYTHING. Including that I haven’t finished a painting in over a year.

BUT!
I finally have! Lookie!

This painting has been in the works for an entire year. And I use the phrase “in the works” very loosely indeed. Mostly what that means is that it has sat in the middle of my house not being worked on more than five minutes a week or so. Occasionally it would irritate me that it was taking up space (it’s 30”x40”) and I would think that if I wasn’t going to actually work on it, maybe I should just paint over it (many attempts at painting over the past year were given up on and painted white again). However, each time I looked at this one with that in mind I ended up not, because despite having no desire to actually paint it, I liked the way it was coming out.

And finally, I finished it!

Because it turns out that having tiny tumors the size of a very small bead in your head can actually have a HUGE difference on how you feel and what you can do. So many things that I basically gave up for the past year are starting to look interesting again. Not that there hasn’t been ample reason to not be enthusiastic about things (flaps hand at the world in general), but who knew something that small could make such a huge difference? And if that, right there, isn’t a life lesson, I don’t know what is.

The world is changing, and we have to change with it, so no idea if you will get any more art, or if a year of silence is the new norm, but for now, I am happy to share this.

*Purely artistic note: the composition would be stronger if I lightened the teal, but I am not going to. I like that the values are so similar, and the interest comes from other things. For those of you who remember my Greece adventures, this painting is inspired by that trip. At the base of the road from our villa, this bit of the road had been washed away by all the flooding, and I fell in love with the pattern.

And the theme of that entire trip was community pulling together after a disaster to clean things up and build things better. Not a bad thing to remember as we decide what direction to go next.