Back to the Artists Studio – Last night I finally started painting again. The excitement and inspiration spilled over into the next day. It is a liberating feeling after being stifled for so long and suddenly it all makes sense.
I think the only negative is that suddenly there are more ideas, images and concepts than I can get done in the time available. This is when my lists get overwhelming.
I first started on the third in a series of swallow paintings. The work is smaller than the two previous but more detailed, with a larger population of swallows than the previous paintings.
The name of the work is the celebration, it is a scene from a local bridge in Rowlett after the spring rain. I saw a swarm of swallows that surrounded the bridge and flew under and around the structure. There was a feeling of excitement; nature in celebration, the drought was finally over.
The second painting I work on was a brand new painting called calvary The last time I went to church, I had an amazing image of calvary surrounded by stained glass. This is going to be one of my most colorful paintings and it is a bit of a departure from previous works.
I’m very excited about finally getting back to work and I can’t wait to see the new views as they become real.
Rejuvenating a Garden – So many things in gardening mimic life, it’s realizing them that offers us wisdom.
After ridiculous heat and a garden that got away from me, after all the beautiful blooms I anticipated have failed, I forget why I started gardening in the first place.
In Texas heat and humidity you stand and look at a mess you started in the spring that is now out of your control and succumbing to summer heat. Welcome to one’s life, finding that joy is what this post is all about. Here are my wisdoms from the weeds.
Mulch often:Mulch is the gardens’ skin, it keeps moisture in and combats heat and weeds, it is armor for the growing garden.
We all need a thick skin, it will keep the bad out and keep the
good in, a parent needs to start mulching their children at a very
young age-a thick skin is important.
Water when needed but not too often:You would think watering a garden is a no-brainer but the best way to kill a garden, especially in Texas thick clay soils is overwatering.
Don’t overwater your children or yourself for that matter, don’t
take yourself too seriously and don’t rush in to make sure your
kids have everything they need. A little bit of patience and
perseverance grows character and it’s a beautiful flower.
There is more to a garden than just flowers: So many reasons to garden, don’t just aspire for one particular thing. Notice the wildlife, the interesting weeds, enjoy the fruits and vegetables and most of all, learn everything you can. This is kind of self explanatory for your life, learn, enjoy, explore, don’t just focus on one objective-be adventurous.
Don’t use Chemicals: No, I’m not preaching, but you do kill much of what would actually help your garden and the garden can do a lot on its own if you don’t cripple it with chemicals. Ok, that sounded preachy.
This is twofold-don’t surround yourself with toxic people and
don’t try so hard to solve a problem you end up causing more
problems, think first, realize consequences before
you create more for yourself.
Transplanting can often revive a dying plant: I have seen plants magically come back to life after simply being transplanted. Suddenly a dormant plant sends up new life and even flowers.
Transplant yourself, change is great for the soul. Often a change is
the best thing you can do to start living again, challenge yourself,
awaken your inner seed.
Deadheading often brings about new growth and flowers: You rejuvenate a plant when you remove its spent blooms, it works to create flowers instead of reseeding.
Don’t hold on to old ways or things, sometimes we need to throw
off our pasts, our old language and doubts before we can grow
again.
The beauty of a garden happens over time: There is the initial bloom you buy from a store, the reason you were attracted in the first place to the specific plant. After the initial blooms fade there is so much more that happens, the roots go deeper, the flowers get more complex and it gets healthier and more vibrant with time.Be more interested in the long term than the transient. Don’t panic as things in your life change and be patient as you discover the big picture.
Don’t chose the wrong plant: If you plant a cactus in a rainforest, the results are not going to be good. Can you do it? Yes, but it will take more time, more materials and more attention.Know who you are, be who you are. Don’t force yourself into someones’ perceived garden, realize how much more work and attention you will need for the same result.
Have fun:If you look at the garden as a task, that is exactly what it will be. Have fun, enjoy yourself, get dirty and did I mention; Learn a lot.Sometimes we are so intense about living, about goals, about expectations we forget we are here to enjoy, to have fun. Today I dug in the garden and it felt amazing. Stop, and enjoy your life, winter will be here sooner than you think.
Find old friends among the weeds: This is one of the primary reasons I started writing this post. While digging out the seeds and mulching the garden I found old friends. I rediscovered how much I enjoy digging in the soil. I stopped and enjoyed a moment gardening; it was like spring again.
I also found plants that had reseeded, last years flowers that reappeared, I love perennials. I would have never even realized them if I didn’t stop and dig in the soil and rejuvenate the garden. I remembered why I started gardening in the first place. Despite the heat, despite the sweat and toil and scars on barehands, I never use gloves. I realize nature is the force that rejuvenates me and gardening makes me remember that.
So get out there, enjoy nature, start a garden or just stop and enjoy someone else’s, Learn, read, find out what you loved as a child and rejuvenate your own garden, the results will amaze you!
Learning to Social – Back to the original post, it takes time. There are shortcuts to find and retaining clients but there are no shortcuts to knowing them. You can’t fake relationship with a potential client, you must be there for them as they are for you.
I speak with the metaphor of a gardener and being one, it seems appropriate. Disperse seeds, don’t expect a quick pay out but realize why you are in the business in the first place, do you care about your customers?
If you don’t care about them, they will quickly not care about you and your product. I believe in laying the future, getting to know people, having more people realize you may something they need and living life with a passion that pays when others endeavors don’t
In the end, I have no doubt that I will reap the benefits of the broad garden of pictures, thoughts and ideas which will one day be book covers, stories in e-books and paintings on walls, it just takes time, did I mention it takes a lot of time.
You just need to use your time wisely. Do what you love and do it well and often and share it with as many people who care about what you are selling, the rewards will come much like the garden that grows from the seeds you planted in the spring, and it will be beautiful.
I had an amazing Christmas-miracles abound. We tend to see things how we are used to seeing things and often miracles are overlooked because we were looking for or waiting for the wrong miracle and missed the great things around us happening. I believe the presence of something greater is around us all the time-it’s the feeling you get staring at a sunset, or the feeling of a winter storm on Christmas-a momentary feeling of peace that supersedes the everyday feeling of stress and crisis we go through.
I always tell a bride-usually it’s the bride as they are the ones that usually stress about a wedding- that everything will work out in its time and the things that don’t will be the things you remember or you can laugh about if you let yourself. I believe it’s the same scenario dealing with holidays, especially Christmas. For one day out of the year we expect to have peace, to be able to guess what our loved ones want for Christmas, to have the amount of money we need without going over budget and for the family and friends for one day to put down their differences and enjoy each other around the kitchen table. Every Christmas is the same-start off being conservative about money, start out being excited and by the time it is over you can’t wait to tear down the dried up tree and put off all the feelings of sadness or auld lang sine for the next year when we’ll try it one more time.
I have been schooled in miracles for the last two years because Christmas didn’t turn the way it was expected-it turned out better than I could have even imagined or tried to plan and it wasn’t any of the gifts or the perfect smile that a family member experienced from that extra special gift-it was the way the time went without the control of being able to sculpt this perfect day and that’s where the miracle comes in.
The word miracle can be overused, it is usually saved for some great deed, someone coming back from near death, the finding of funds when there were no possibilities, yes that is how we describe a miracle but just as the word love is often misused and mistaken for infatuation the very magic of the word is usually in the subtleties we would normally overlook. Which brings me to last years’ Christmas. My mom fell and broke her hip, how could we enjoy a Christmas season after something traumatic as that? I almost mentally wrote off the season-which is maybe the good thing-the problem with holidays are our expectations are often too high. So instead of shopping, we spent time at a hospital room and none of us could explain the fears we felt and the lack of control each of us felt about the fact that she was in for a surgery which science said she could not live through-first miracle maybe. The break was the best break it could be-if you could look at a broken hip like that but the doctors were positive about her prognosis.
I think one of the hardest things about a crisis during the holiday is the fact that children don’t need to be involved in the stress and worry, so that means just because a dads’ first instinct would be to lay down and watch some mundane show to ease the feeling of depression and worry-we need to go get a tree, decorate it, enjoy egg nog-without the nog and really feel the christmas feeling. This is where shear will comes in play-I don’t have the privilege to have a bad season-my son is watching and learning how to deal with worry and crisis as well as expecting a Christmas he doesn’t want to have to remember as a bad memory. So I shop in between going to the hospital, wrap late in the evening and Christmas eve-don’t feel like I bought enough gifts for everyone-the usual dilemma and we all get through the process as well as we could possibly get through a holiday where someone you love is in the hospital.
Here’s the second miracle-it wasn’t a good or even mediocre day-it was special and beautiful in its own way. My mother learned things in the hospital she wouldn’t have, found strength in other people, allowed herself to give up control of her situation and shared her strength with other people-the gifts she got were more than we could have wrapped. The family joined together and felt that feeling of overcoming a crisis, there was hope for the New Year. My son and I got perspective about what Christmas really means and not what marketing would have you believe-we don’t deserve anything specific, we don’t need to overspend and put ourselves in debt to get ourselves and others everything we deserve-instead we got just what we needed-family-the closeness, the true bond, we watched other families coming together-we got perspective on our situations and appreciated things we would have overlooked if it weren’t for the wonderful misfortune of a broken hip. That is when you have witnessed a miracle when you call a misfortune wonderful-the presence you feel and joy is the unexplained phenomena that follows and just as a haunting can only be describe and understood by someone who has felt it, the same goes with the presence of God on that special, crazy, hectic day we call Christmas.
I will leave this year’s miracles for the next post so I won’t completely bore the reader as well as infuriate further whoever is looking for punctuation and grammar-this is what you call free thought, plain and simple. So I hope if this was even a bit interesting you’ll follow to part two when this year’s miracle is explained.
Artbygordon: Original oils on canvas, Original pastels on paper celebrating the beauty and mystery of nature. Water and night skies are my specialties.
