when morning comes

 by Rain Trueax

For the month of March, with no plan to do so, I watched absolutely no television, movies, nor listened to any radio talk shows. It started because of my bout of nightshade intolerance, but it went beyond that as I could not stand the idea of watching the television screen. After a week or so, I began to consider what television had been doing to my daily life. What I learned is it was filling in time. Although I had already reduced (not none until March began) watching political news, I still had cable for HGTV, documentaries, and a Hallmark movie once or twice a week. We also had Curiosity Stream for nature and historic films, but they seemed too simplified and more aimed at kids than adults. Pretty and all but nothing much to learn.

As I recovered from being sick, things changed for what I wanted my days to look like. I cut back on the Internet-- for a while none, and then very little, but gradually found a reasonable amount of time to check on friends at Facebook, and of course, read newspapers and online magazines with news stories. Still, it was nothing like it had been.

The cable, political news that I had been watching had had some events covered, but a lot of it had been by pundits to tell me what I should think about what I'd seen. If I had been a right winger, I'd have been watching shows like Newsmax or if I was a left winger, it'd be MSNBC. Neither one was going to give both sides of anything. That's not what their audience expected from their pundits.

So, what did I replace that time with-- what am I still replacing it with? Well, watching the clouds in the sky as they changed outside my bedroom window. I got some info on the names of cloud types (cumulus, cirrus, stratus, and nimbus). The problem quickly became that clouds mixed together and finding pure cloud shapes wasn't happening often. Clouds have many varieties. Maybe just enjoying them was the ticket.

I enjoyed watching the trees move with the wind, the birds fly past the window, and the mountain about three miles or so away. In some ways, it was all nothing. In other ways, it was my real world.

Reading aloud continued, but we left behind the non-fiction to try a book I'd never read, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. I didn't expect to like it but got into these characters. We ended up buying more books in the series of five. Currently, we are working on the fourth in the series-- with the third waiting on the dresser. They weren't in order but the fourth didn't need to be. I do not plan to read the fifth given reviews I'd read of it. Ranch Boss has been doing all the aloud reading, which has been enjoyable for us both as the dialogue in those books is fun. 

The three cats got used to the idea that I was not in the living room but rather our bedroom. They adjusted to that and I enjoyed watching them as they worked out their own relationships-- not always in good moods.

March also got me my second Moderna and finally I am, at two weeks after that, which theoretically means fully protected, only the more you read, the more you know it doesn't always work that way. Still, I am glad I did it and hope that those who can will do so. What we need to know about viruses is a long way off, I suspect.

From not watching television, I got used to not trying to think and just be. I didn't need to fill the space as just being was satisfying. I thought of many things for issues politically, some I might share here someday, but for now, this is it. 

My own conclusion is that television may not be doing our brains or emotions a favor. Like so many things, everyone needs to evaluate that for themselves.

These photos are all from April 2nd as the sun rose with clouds providing a show.

by Diane: Up date on art escape #9: Painting, painting, painting

 

 

 

Have much painting time now that husband's neurology symptoms are addressed.  Feeling lucky that before the mitigating phase of the pandemic we are better equiped to wing it!

 

 

 

stream of chaois :

Two more days until my regular posting time. Yikes. My hubby has been generous. He gets his snacks himself. We watch the birds together. I am plunging deeply into painting before writing this blog. Pardon my disorganization. The weather is great and the little biting bugs are not bugging me. The swallows are nesting and mating. Such subjects are exalting. Exausting!  I have a neat book to read and the review for the book club is next Sunday. Magie Anaton's Rashi's Daughters, Book I Joheved: A Novel of Love and the Talmud in Medieval France. Love the walkers who parade past the other side of house, the street side. What's for dinner?

 Single serving of lasagne last night for hubby. I had gluten free my fan tye rice noodles with spinach and turkey. Not exactly Easter fare. Tonight chicken? Canned smoked fish casserole. We can both eat. Laundry is going. already painted some and it is 8:18 AM. In few minutes will cancel Zoom doctors appointment.to reschedule for in person visit. Got to talk about young grandson coming to rotatil garden that spading was too hard. Ought to get manure so to soften soil for good carrots this year. Got to throw away that unused mini pie shell I made two weeks ago and never filled. What should I order for Fred Myers pick up next weekend? canned beets, canned pumpkin, milk, freezer low on meats. distilled water, 9x9 baking pan for brownies. yogart. This is boring.
The sore on hubby's nose. his rubberband fix to his Bipap mask worked but a week old mask shouldn't fail. Lots of little cares. Loved the article by Gerald Parker about five phases of the pandemic. Sugar ants and rosemary! Wash hands. Great time to go for a walk.

Later:  Yeah, hubby will barbecue the terriaki chicken thighs. We are eating so well and sorry for those who are food challenged. My mind is blank. The jazz plays instead of the constant news. Wonder how our newly widowed neighbor is. Heard a couple on my walk argue about his dog getting into her flower bed. Dog on chain. Children chalk art and paper cut hearts pine cones with googlie eyes for sale. Getting low on cash. grandchild's birthday. Better go and make haste before mail man.

Time to water the garden: Time to go back to original art escape plan.

by Diane; Update #3 How my changes in the studio and palettes make painting more relaxing during stressful times

The past three weeks after hanging 34 paintings at the Albany Publc Library, I have worked to make a space conducive to enjoying painting when I have limited small segments of time. I want to also be there for my husband whose hiatal hernia surgery eleven weeks ago has failed to relieve most of his symptoms. Currently there are many tests underway.  He is in good spirits.

          First, I cleared the clutter.  Too many tools! Nice to have them shelved in our shop.

          Second, I have several palette designs for testing. They each have limited colors. My palette keeps the acrylic paint soft without having to twist off caps and prepare the colors every time I paint.

          Third, for the sake of relaxation, I  reduced the necessity of making complex choices in the process of painting.  I choose only one painting tool on the second painting - the back end of a foam bullet found on one of our neighborhood streets.  

           To be worked out  for the next painting: how to find the most expressive handeling of the bullet.
            Fourth, best of all, I did not need to clean brushes. Too often in the past I left brushes with acrylic paint drying and sticking to the hair.

 

Plastic clam shell from the bakery accommodates 3 jars 
left over from Yoplait's Oui yogurt.

Also fitting into the clam shell are fruit cups, small Tupperware,
and of course one pint size paint jar.
The clam shell is easy to close when I need to instantly drop painting.
to be helpful to my husband.

 

  The canvas board of the first painting was too textured
 for crisp stamped marks.
 I saved the painting by increasing the punch of  yellow and red.
I reverted from my goal and returned to my old ways of resolving paintings.
In the second painting, "Three Color Ability of Knots", I achieved a more relaxing painting time.
On the second one
The second, lower right is on
unfinished wood.





by Diane: New Decade/ New Year's look at my life as an artist

 Before considering my resolutions, this decade, this year, I question my life as a practicing artist. In my current stage of life going on 77 years of age in 2020, I consider my age and the changing of our living location or remaking our home to suit our needs - an expected soon to be reality.  Plus all the conditions of the world around me need to be considered. Putting aside immediate issues for awhile, I consider some hypothetical possibilities far from my reality.
      How would I practice art if I was a Yellow Hat Tibetan Monk? Will such an improbable question stimulate an enlightened goal?


What is missing from the monk's painting paraphernalia?
 No rags? No large container of water to clean brushes?
No container of many brushes?
Only a thermos for his tea and another for water to add to his paint?
Only stir sticks in paint pots to keep paint at the exactly right creamy consistency.
Are the sticks in each color pot tipped with a brush head down in the paint?
Do I remember a few hand made brushes?
 If he uses a different brush for each color, the purity of his colors would be maintained
without contaminating cleaning water or rag. He will not contaminate the environment.
His method insures no waste of precious mineral colors.
Can a brush remain in a gouache type paint without ever being cleaned?
Did he paint with sticks?
Do I see a receptacle for scraping off and collecting excessive paint before applyication?
Knowing his exact working method does not matter.
I have an idea of how I can change my work space process.
 

      I remember my first impression of the artist monk August 13, 2002, at the Drepung Monastery in China, Tibet. Seeing his fascination with my sketches and pen, I handed him a brush pen that I was using. He wanted to try it and I gave it to him for keeps. In my sketch book he drew a self portrait. Later at home I painted Pintolanden ( my poor phonetic spelling of his name). I clearly remember my impression because when I came home, I painted him. His studio was rich in color. I was impressed how cozy he was in stark contrast to the desolate landscape outside. Above all I wanted to work from color pots like his.

The monk's drawing of himself.
 I never explored the meaning of his pose.
Or the meaning of his Buddhist name.

My painting reflects how suited his work space was
to making Thangkas. It should be an ideal space
for meditative, spiritual painting
but I saw this space was impacted
by the world of soda pop and clutter of
plastic bags from recent shopping.
Over his robes he wore a sweater
and under his robes - sweat pants.
He had Western style running shoes.
 On the floor was an open paperback book.
Possibly a corrupting novel?
 

        Historically monks painted meditatively soothed by repeating the same traditional details with minimal need to make independent choices. All their colors were spread out in little pots so they could paint continuously without interruptions to prepare the next color. So impressed, was I that I found a couple of clam shell plastic boxes in which I put  a quarter cup of each acrylic color. I grouped colors that I often mix together. Spritzing them with water whenever they start to dry, these colors remained workable for months. Now I see much more that I can use from the monk's art process.

       On a deeper level, I was impressed in 2002 by the impact of the world on the Tibetan painter, "Pintoladen". He was not isolated from the world.  Tourists like me must be interrupting his work rhythm. He was making thangkas not just for the monastery and local Buddhists but for tourists who may or may not be on a Buddhist spiritual journey. The sale of his work along with other spiritual items made at the monastery supported the monastery in today's world driven by money. Today's world is not perfect.  Neither would returning to a theocracy be better. In by gone ages, the peasants provided for the the ruling monastery.Now it is moneyfrom maybe the Chinese government and tourists.

        At home in 2002  I failed to think of our core similarities and differences until now when I watched a film about a Buddhist convert. Next Wednesday's post will be a review of "A Buddhist with a Camera".

In the next couple of Wednesday posts,
 I will update what kind of art and how I make my work space
comfortable and workable.

    

by Diane : The value of art to me and quotes

My personal story:

I learn positive values of aging from my art making. 

My golden years are an empty canvas or book

that I fill with nurturing care for myself like I care for my paintings.

 

 

Art is a license for me to play, fantasize, and be young at heart.

 

Art is healing was the most compelling theme in a book I read recently. Since last week's post which was a review of "Disturbances in the Field", a novel by Lynn Sharon Schwartz, I am looking for more stories of  the art's power to impact the quality of our lives. One of the secondary stories within the novel was about the main character calming herself by coloring in a children's coloring book after two life tragedies. She hid her coloring books under couch pillows when family and friends came unexpected.  During the eighties adults would think she was digressing to childhood. Today public opinion has become more accepting. Big chain stores like Target, Fred Myers, art galleries, craft stores and even grocery stores market adult coloring books. Artist friends of mine are not ashamed to say at times they find coloring books soothing. Art permits us regardless of age to play.

 

Art saves lives. Practicing an art improves quality of life making living joyful and rich. For example this morning at breakfast I watched the swallows in flight, a couple of foxes hunting and the lighting on the field and woods changing color with the heat of summer. I was looking with the interest of an artist preparing to paint. Seeing like an artist is enough to enhance living. But I wanted more. So I rushed outside to paint. My iphone camera doesn't capture my excitement or how I see the colors. Selecting what I paint from the landscape is empowering.

 

My experiences are reflected  in quotes my sister-in-law Debby Wenzel gave me.

An hour a day of art makes me happier. An hour of art per week reduces depression.


In art as in life much can be forgiven if your values are right. Experiencing the world my values have changed over the years. I would rather buy art supplies than most material things. I see beauty in people and the environment in unconventional ways.

Art humanizes people. One example is children learning to play musical instruments and playing in a band or orchestra. Another is the art of cursive writing helps to develop a child's brain. Art is the sublime manifestation of the human spirit. Henry Louis Gates Jr.

On the internet I found this quote shared by Donna Watson.
Art is not just ornamental, it is an enhancement of life.
It is a path in itself, a way out of the predictable and conventional...a map to self discovery.  Gabrielle Roth

by Diane Widler Wenzel: Triangle strong painting support discovered while cleaning studio

The certain tolerance that I have for chaos in our home reached a limit when I had to move very large paintings to get into a cabinet for frequently needed supplies ranging from sketch books to picture hanging wire. Worse yet too many painting rags, a large box of acrylic paints on the floor, because every inch of the work bench was covered and piled high. When starting to organize the mess, I didn't expect to discover a better engineered way to make stretcher bars for large paintings from the poor quality of second growth wood now available.
        Organizing my studio space is easier if I can eliminate some of the stuff in it first.

        Looking through my work, I could not bear to select a single picture to retire by making it into a floor covering, tablecloth, or into a practical useful thing. Sifting through my work and retiring a few at a time periodically strengthened the meaningfulness of my personal body of work. After years of sifting, I have come to the point where I feel almost all my remaining works are worthy of keeping.        There were, however, the two large ones leaning against the cabinet. They were from Habitat for Humanity for $7.00 each. I thought they would be good experiments or canvases I could use for play with neighborhood kids. So last summer I  prepared them by painting acrylic colored gesso over the original owner's paintings. A few weeks ago I experimented on one to figure out what combination of glasses or contact lenses would work over my cataract replacements focused for only near vision.  But the other canvas had mildew where it was water damaged. The neighbor kids did not come to paint yet on a damaged canvas. I didn't want to put a lot of effort into painting something that would not be healthy to hang in our home so I felt good about preparing it for the bonfire.  I ripped through the canvas with my utility knife and pried the canvas free. Then the rough knotty pine completely straight was revealed to my amazement

How could the stretcher bars be straight and true made from such rough knotty wood?  My experience was that clear straight grained wood is necessary to make a canvas that would hang flat on the wall. All the warped stretcher bars to my experience had knots.
          The secret was revealed - triangle strength.  The triangular shaped corners kept the corners square and the holes in the pegboard helped to keep the paintings light. For such a big canvas it is amazing that no brace bars were needed. Laminated to the wood is quarter round that has a triangular cross section with one side curved. the triangular shape also prevented the support from interfering with the painting. So strong is the combination of corners and the lamination that there is no need for elaborate brace bars which double the weight of commercial stretcher bars. Another plus to this construction is the relative thickness. I could store two of these to every one of the good commercially built frames this size.

The canvas under the stretcher bars is also usable. The mildewed portion is trimmed away. The rest of the canvas waits for the neighborhood children to come and play with it. The canvas is heavy enough to become an area floor covering or table protector if not wall hanging.

Diane Widler Wenzel :Thankful for memories

Looking through my stack of paintings, I recall many memories tucked into each piece.



This  airbrush on newsprint is from a photo taken of my mother in 1934 when she married my father.

This is my first airbrush work done at a Linn Benton airbrush class. Done in 1986 a week after I  broke my left wrist!  I am proud of  how I was able to open the Higgin’s ink bottle just with my right hand and drop ink into the pen I was holding in a hand mostly enclosed in the cast.

For this post I pulled out paintings and drawings I have stored in a stack on shelves. The watercolor of the woman on top is a painting of my mother  in her last years.

Each one of my pictures has memories of the people who taught me like my parents, treasured teachers, and people who support me like my husband, family and friends. I am thankful I have been in a position where I can be so creative. My stacks of art work is a happy visual diary of my life.

by Diane Widler Wenzel: My meal prep like my painting process, My table like my hanging of my paintings

The presentation of a simple meals is as important to me as the arrangement of  my paintings hanging in my home.

I don’t think how my work will effect interior decorating when I paint so I am always happily surprised when our living space and my paintings enhance one another. These surprises are thrust into my awareness when someone requests a viewing of my work and I start arranging work on my walls that I think will suit them.

I was surprised to see the lighting change during the day picking up the light in the painting, "Swimming Free". What surprised me was the painting created an enhanced lightness as if there was an additional skylight in our home.

My open storage is like my refrigerator storage. I pull out ingredients with water themes to hang for my friends who are coming this Thursday to acquire a couple of paintings. Although I am not actively promoting my art, if friends or family want my work, I am happy to see my favorite paintings go to a good home. Then I can visit and in some cases I can borrow it for shows.

Hanging art in my home is like meal preparation. I  can go to the refrigerator or studio to pull out the ingredients for showcasing  my meal whether my art is painting or food.

I should not be surprised that my meal presentation and painting choices are so similar. My meal prep is like my "laissez faire" painting.  I don't know what the menu will be until I see what ingredients are ready for me to prepare or hang.

My palette : My table
accepted and award winning in a 2003 Art About Agriculture Exhibit

The paintings on my walls can not be seen seperately from the totality of  living.  I should not be surprised.

 I see them as nurturing and as satisfying as a good meal.

Part 1: What I do with my prolific accumulation of paintings

In this post and next Wednesday's post I will be giving examples of how I manage my collection of my own art while remaining prolific and not promoting sales.  Not magic!!

Example 1: Further development of a finished piece.

Of all my Ritner Creek paintings this one started in 2017 was the least exciting.

A young tree died over the winter so I entertained the idea of painting the essence of the tree’s death struggle. To activate the energy I swiped discarded credit cards with red and brown paint to symbolize the warming, more shallow water.

Paint straight from the tube,  has made the painting more disturbing than after my first swipes. The patio painting area by 9:00 AM was too hot. Tomorrow I will decide how to proceed. Next week I hope I can publish the resolution of the "Death Struggles of a Ritner Creek Tree."  I will also explain how I came to think less about individual pieces and each piece as a part of a body of work enabling me to make decisions on what is representative and worthy of sharing. I treat my art like garden plants, after they have been seen sometimes I prune by finding new uses for old work.

Painting from location, then at home

On my fourth day I still have not looked at my digital images of the location. But now I have reached a  turning point and tomorrow I will decide if this painting will undergo further abstraction or will I add children playing in the creek. Tomorrow on this blog will be more about the camera sas a tool in painting. Below: The progress on an oil painting on a 40" x 60" canvas.

 

 

 

 

My Artist Life While Aging

One of the boxes of my mother's creative sculpting and her automated doll's violin.
Her display dolls from the 50’s are represented and documented in the Rosalie Whyel Doll Museum in Belleview, Washington.
 I also wrote an article in Doll Reader Magazine about how my mother made me feel growing up as her doll creating partner.
 I am humbled by how well she made doll making a shared family involvement. She even extending her sharing her skills in an leading a Girl Scout interest group in which we casted our own clay sculpted puppets for Jack and the Bean Stock characters.
 She introduce me to plein air painting as a group activity with other children in the Big Sur Camp Ground.

At age 75, as a result of my mother's nurturing and my continued involvement in art, I am grateful to her for my now having the most productive and creative period in my life. I am filled with joy and thankfulness. Yet, I am aware that my elderly years are precious, much more than the selling of the art I make. So I am immersing myself in the process of creating as opposed to marketing.

The paintings accumulate.

 My priority to do lists includes making an illustrated Power Point catalog containing all the work  ready to be exhibited or sold. Will it be enough for my heirs to have my art well documented with catalog numbers and my statements?  Maybe at some point I should seek on line painting sales and gallery representation taking a load off my heirs? Or finding more places to donate it?

My husband and I do less and less of the things we used to do. We no longer belong to a roller skating club,  or a mountain rescue club. We do not snowshoe, or camp in a tent while backpacking to name a few of the ever growing list of things we no longer want to do. So my husband is home with me more with all our toys taking up space. Even when we got rid of a few toys like a couple of Model A's, my art encroaches on  my husband's shop area.

 I am looking for another artist who can use some of my unneeded art paraphernalia. Some of  the art media I have been fortunate enough to have experienced recently is paper making. Paper making was a short lived family activity. Other remnants of media that I am giving away include bookmaking, ceramics, batik, mosaics and cement garden sculptures. I am having difficulty thinking about giving up oil painting. I am starting to paint in oils now that the weather is nice but this might be the last season of oils if the watercolors without glass becomes my primary medium.

Years ago faced with a full shed of her decades old disintegrating latex dolls, I selected a few more permanent tools that reflected her creative process.   I kept a plaster mold for casting  and her books that instructed her hoping they would become family heirlooms. Maybe some family member will want to use Margaret Widler Doll heirlooms in making installations or even videos or what can be imagined.

As an artist I see my life in phases. When I was a very young child painting was all about the doing of it. The result did not hold my interest. In the in between years I saw myself as the maker of a product that would please a teacher, or someone who might buy it. Now I still care about how the work looks when finished. Caring is central to the process. I care that my paintings satisfy me. I hope  to involve the viewers of my paintings in the process seeding their creative drive as well. I've come full circle doing art for the sake of the experience of being in the present, always learning and really seeing.

Paper making paraphernalia in my husband's shop.
 I want to give away all the paper making stuff plus cotton paper pulp I have used to strengthen recycled paper.
 

aging and changing

by Rain Trueax
 

Currently, as a writer, it might appear to someone around me that I have not been working hard. There's been needed research, but that's actually fun. I let my computer print off the needed pages-- no work for me. What I am mostly doing is mental as I let my story get populated before I start creating the scenes. Growing characters requires my slowing down and just thinking, letting the little mining town (fictional) become real in my mind. I don't take many notes although I have a yellow pad with some of the aspects on it. So, it's developing but I admit my thoughts are elsewhere.

Like to this article:

Old Enough to Die

When I was in my middle years, I don't recall coming to a year and thinking-- this is important. Mostly, the importance came out of what stage my kids were in. When I turned 50 though, the fledglings had fled the nest, were feathering their own, and I did think-- what will my 50s hold. To celebrate turning it, I suggested my husband and I go to Oregon Caves, where i had last been as a child.

My 50s held remarkable good things. The year I would turn 56, we bought our desert home. Those were years I walked a lot, hiked places I never had, took photos of myself (glamour and sexy shots) for the fun of doing it. I think I felt more conscious of my looks than I had in any younger years. I read a lot of books on improving my life, figuring out what I wanted (If you are at that point in your life, I highly recommend In the Meantime.). I did a lot of sculptures, painted, took risks, and did things I'd never done before. I changed major things spiritually. To sum up my 50s in one word, it'd be adventure-- of the emotional and mental sort. My 50s were fun with some pain intertwined. That's what adventure is about though-- ups and downs.

Entering my 60s, the picture above here along Romero Creek, I found a new awareness. When I was younger, I was supposed to do this or that. I lived a lot of my life doing what i was supposed to do. I had lived a full lifetime at 60. I had gone through changes, taken what i wanted, let go of what I decided no longer worked. It hadn't been a big, glamorous life, but I felt good at where I was. From then on, whatever was left (if anything) was for me-- I could do whatever I wanted. I didn't need to do anything if I didn't want to. No more self-improvement books.
 

One momentous year came midway into my 60s with another significant date. I turned 65, which meant eligible for Medicare. The picture above was the day i went into town to sign up for it. I wanted a photo to memorialize it. I felt excited at the new time with being officially old, and able to get Social Security, although I waited a bit for that.

The next big change came the year I would turn 68-- and decided to become an indie writer with not only the books I'd written much of my life, but with new ones I was still writing. Until then, my writing had been more of a hobby than a serious endeavor. Becoming an indie writer led to amazing pressures and discoveries. When I could have been sitting on a cruise-liner, instead I was calculating how to promote a book, writing blurbs, creating covers, reading devastating reviews on my books, and generally moving into, what was for me, virgin territory. Again, it was a mix of joy and pain with no way to predict which would be coming that day. It really was amazing to take such a new risk (and sharing creative endeavors to be judged by others is an emotional risk. When the work is rejected or ignored, it hurts. Anyone stepping out that way will tell the same story). It was time consuming and hard work and in years where I would have expected to be sliding into a comfortable old age.

I wrote more books and they were about adventure, sex, heroes, women getting what they wanted, the land, places, and history. They always ended with making a reader feel good-- that's the promise of romances.

Though no one watched me, I felt self-conscious, as I laughed my way through royalty free modeling sites judging men and women there for being hot or not. He's not strong enough-- why don't they have more blond male models? I'd written books when it didn't matter that i had an image to represent them. It was important once i needed covers.

This wasn't the original cover for [Desert Inferno] but it was the first book I brought out as an indie writer. I needed an ugly man for the cover-- you know, the kind who actually is attractive but have those rugged features that make him not know it... They don't exist in the royalty free world but I see them now and again in real life-- without the nerve to ask them to let me use them on a cover ;). I tried many things but eventually got around the cover issue by emphasizing her and blurring him.

The year I would turn 70, we were supposed to be in Yellowstone but that was the government shutdown and the park was closed. We took our relatively new to us travel trailer in a trip around Oregon-- the eastern part of the state. It involved rivers, lakes, mountains, museums, more ideas, and finally I got to see Tsagaglalal, She Who Watches, a significant petroglyph/pictograph in the Columbia River Gorge. For years, i had wanted to see her and what more perfect time than now when I put so much into my writing. She fits a time as a writer, observer of life, but someone who still wants to contribute in new ways. (If you are into myths, this is one of them about her-- Legend of Tsagaglalal according to the Wishram people.)

When I read Barbara Ehrenreich's thoughts on being over 70, I related to it though I haven't read the book. I had never had a desire to get really old although I hadn't intended on checking out just yet. Still, this year, I'll be 75 and that is older than I expected to reach (I thought I'd die before 30 and once that didn't happen, I quit predicting a year). I am now genuinely old, the category where if something happened to put me in a newspaper, they'd describe me as elderly. I can see old age bodily changes far more than I ever did in earlier years- these are the reverse teen years.

Because of my age, I have made some decisions on what i would not do to stay living if something catastrophic hit. Those might, of course, change if something catastrophic happens to my health-- and for many of us, it will-- although, some just go. It's how my mother and father did it. That doesn't guarantee that it'll be that way for me. I don't fear being dead-- the dying process though is the worrisome part. You can't though get into your 70s and not think some about it.

My answer to “How do I make time for painting?”

How I make time to paint is such an interesting question,  I wonder why it never occurred to me.

This is an excellent question for all of you beginning for the first time  as well as those painters with busy schedules.

The flip side of making time to paint is how I make time for taking care of myself, quality time with family, being a friend. Writing a blog to me is an outreach to creative friends.

 Of course there are the everyday chores I  make into art experiences. When it is time to vacuum, the first thing to do is rearrange the art on my walls so while doing repetitive chores, my mind is busy seeing new relationships between my paintings.

My patient, supportive husband deserves a great deal of credit.  He shares grocery shopping,  house and yard work as well as helping me prepare the paintings to be hung. The whole house is a staging area for my half finished paintings and sometimes when my husband and I are together, I am as though far away looking at my paintings.

The number one thing I have in common with those just beginning to paint is finding a medium that is best suited to my lifestyle. I am still looking for ways to increase the quality of my painting time. Cooking is creative and enjoyable to me but cleaning up afterwards not so much. The day before yesterday I purchased an Oster 12" electric fry pan with a ceramic surface. It heats fast and cleans with a simple wipe with a wet towel.  It holds promise for a variety of cooking methods so for some jobs step aside Instant Pot. I will have more creative time now.

Very important is having work areas that can be easily setup and put away quickly. I carry an on the go bag for travels whether I am going from my studio to the patio or to just pick up groceries or a larger bag for vacations.

 Just this week I found that 2 small pocket Van Gogh palettes half filled with pan watercolors are working the best with dilute gloss medium in the adjacent empty wells. The Van Gogh palettes have the right amount of paint and mixing surfaces  for the 11X14 inch canvas boards. These boards are fine to carry in a suitcase.

The prepared plywood boards take considerable work to prepare for painting and I don't like the rough feel. I will continue adding more coats of gesso and plaster. The translucency and wetting ability of  the paint respond so interestingly to customized surfaces, I don't want to go back to unmodified machine made surfaces.
 

The next most important suggestion is immersing myself in seeing. Even when not actually painting I think how I would in response to what I see.  I enjoy looking with painting in mind every day and plan the next painting series.

Please take a minute or two to vote on topics that would be useful to you on making time to paint.Answer in comments but if you prefer I will be happy to get your email at dondianewenzel@msn.com

1) A series of blogs about my on the go painting paraphernalia.

2) Inspirational books and web sites to jump start painting.

3) More about my progress in finding a way to work outside doing watercolors that are durably finished, ready to hang without frame and glass.

4) My remedies when a laps of time has occurred when I couldn't paint and I find it hard to start again.

5) Do I have to paint every day to consider myself an artist?

Healing Times

by Rain Trueax

I've written often how much nature means in my life. I use it in my books as a secondary character. It is part of any creative endeavor to feel nature and let it fill me. I believe it's healing.

This blog by Susan Tweit was inspirational to me and thought it might be to some of you. It's not just about a conference she attended, a lot of driving time, but also about her creative friendships along the way. These are what I find especially rewarding-- creative connections, where a love of the same things is shared. Such relationships are also healing.

Susan J. Tweit-- Windshield time listening and making time

And in view of that, the rest of this blog is photos of nature here in Tucson, which I always enjoy on a multitude of levels. If you are stressing, and many are these days, take some time with each image and let it fill you as it would if you were here.

 soft

 sharp

 overhead

looking down

from the skies

It is a bountiful world. We need to keep it that way in all the ways we know.