Measure Up!

Sometimes when painting a piece, I can feel that it will sell.  One such piece sold off the easel.  Several that I know will sell are still waiting for their owners to claim them. Or to be born...   Then again, sometimes I know when a painting  will not sell.  The above, "Roman Love Triangles" is one of those.  It is from a photo I took in 2002.  I loved the dragon in the balusters staring at the the oblivious couple.  I doubt many people will share my amusement, but that's okay.  There's still room in my basement.
But I am baffled by consumers who buy, not because they love the painting, but because of its inches.  I was in the Torpedo Factory studio when a couple came in and pulled out a measuring tape.  They held it up against several of my partners' pieces and mine as well.  Then they left.  An hour later they came back, measured again.  I wondered if they would pull out fabric swatches to see if it matched the sofa.  They left again.  When they returned they settled on a piece that was 24 inches tall and was mostly red and yellow.
People should buy art that they love.  Repaint the room or buy a new couch, if necessary.  But love the art.

'Tis the season of their Discontent

The rental season is upon us.  We (I) wait with bated breath for the first complaint.  My brothers posted a note for the tenants: "If there is a problem, call Cindy."  Most magnanimous of them.  I'm also the one who goes to jail if there is anything hincky about our finances.
My acupuncturist thinks my qi would benefit if I would envision  a place where I am "most me" and at my happiest.  I should do this whenever I feel tense and also when I meditate.  I immediately thought of the porch at the Vineyard.  I recall of the angle of the sunlight, the smell of the sea and the bayberry, the drone of the mosquitoes.  Happy place!
 But it's a short jump from that porch to unhappy thoughts.  My mind is on the porch, feeling the breeze, and the next instant I'm thinking about the septic tank.  We have been stewards of the house for 27 years and I don't think we've ever had it pumped.  I remember vaguely that my parents had it done.  I believe it is under the yard in back.  No telling where the opening is.  Probably six feet into the brambles. My mother told me as a child not to play in a certain corner of the yard, but was that the septic tank or the underground root cellar?
If thinking makes it so, I expect a call soon from the tenants, to report that the back yard is bubbling and ripe with odour.
Happy, happy...

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

Last night I attended the opening of my show "Summertime" at the Jarrett Thor Gallery in Colonial Beach, Va.  It was quite the exciting party what with the fire trucks and the ABC (Virginia Liquor Board) on site.
No doubt you expect I set the gallery ablaze.  Not so.  Turns out my opening was scheduled for the same night as the annual Fire Truck Parade.  Fire trucks from Maryland and Virginia, with horns cranking and wailing, drove through the tiny town of Colonial Beach for 45 minutes.  It was rather like being locked in a bell tower.
To add further merriment, an agent from the ABC liquor board dropped in, flashed her badge, and demanded that the gallery stop serving wine.  Apparently, the agent felt that the wine was unduly influencing people to buy art.  (I mean really, how else are we to peddle the stuff.)  No one was buying art at the moment, but the agent was not dissuaded.  The wine was corked and put away.  Sigh....

Sam, the Happy Thresher

When last I posted, my son was about to leave me with his bundle of terror, Sam, the possible pit bull.    He casually mentioned  that Sam could leap over a couch from a standstill.  I didn't believe them.  Now I'm  convinced Sam is a four-legged pogo stick on meth.  He bounces through the house at warp speed.  At night, when I'm watching tv on from my bed, Sam dashes in, leaps over me to the other side of the bed. Then jumps back on the bed, over me and to the floor.  Repeatedly.  He finds this endlessly amusing.  I find it less so.   He also enjoys shredding things. See above.  In effort to divert him from my pillows and sofas, I offered him stuffed animals I picked up from a garage sale.   Daily sacrificial animals, if you will. I've run out of sacrifices with 8 days left. I could offer up a raw chicken, but then he's allergic to chicken ( and beef, lamb, rice, duck, salmon, venison.)  He's on a kangaroo and red lentil diet.  (I don't think I actually believed that until I saw the bag of food.) Sam prefers objects he can sink his teeth into, so nylabones are ignored.  He loves squeaker toys, or rather loves to  eviscerate the toy and render the squeaker mute.  I tried the "indestructible" toys.  He munched through them in a trice. 
Did I mention that he is often sweet and cuddly?

The four-foot flamingo was the last of the garage sale animals.
Beneath the fuzz was a hard layer wrapped around a core of styrofoam pellets.  I didn't want the pellets all over the living room so I put the flamingo in the yard.  Sam spent 10 minutes trying to drag the wide flamingo through the narrow dog door.  It took some maneuvering, but he succeeded.  And when I wasn't looking, loosed a geyser of styrofoam all over the porch.  

I told my son before he left on his honeymoon that if his plane went down, I was not adopting Sam.  He laughed and said, "Yes, you will."  Drat.

Run, Roo, Run!

 My son Ned read my blog and announced that it was depressing.  I was going for "wry."  Ah well...  So, in the interest of happy thoughts, I present my grand-dog Sam.
(I told my son not to adopt a dog, that he couldn't afford it.) What do I know?  Ned rescued Sam, a mixed breed.  Ned insists
that Sam is part pit bull, and is unreasonably proud of it.  Everyone knows that mutts are healthier than pedigree dogs. Everyone but Sam, who cost my son and his fiance a small fortune in vet bills.  Major food allergies.  For awhile, the allergy went into remission with zyrtec and a limited diet of venison and sweet potato.  Alas, that didn't work and he's now on a diet of (I kid you not) kangaroo and red lentils.
I see Sam every week.  I've petted him twice.  He never stands still long enough to receive affection. He zooms through our house as if he's going for a land speed title.  At home he chews the normal things, rugs, shoes, hands (Sam doesn't seem to know where the toy ends and the human begins).  One day he chewed a hole in the middle of their memory foam mattress.  Yes, he's a rascal all right.
 

My son is getting married next week. Sam is not attending.  While my son and his wife honeymoon, Sam will zoom through our house for two weeks.  I will lob pellets of kangaroo and red lentil at him as he passes by. 

Beginnings Again

The last time I had a puppy, my mother was in the end stages of Alzheimer's.  Our beloved black lab had died the week before-- the same week my mother moved to a nursing home near me.  I visited her twice a day.  Alzheimer's units are more like  lunatic asylums than assisted living facilities. If it hadn't been so disturbing, it might have been funny in a twisted, black way.  Clio, above, was the picture of innocence the day we got her.  Little did we know her penchant for vegetation would become a mania.  When her ball hit a bush or a plant, she took it personally.  She became quite adept at ripping plants from the ground and limbs from their trunks.  She also had a cute trick of flinging full water bowls across the room. And she ate all of our azaleas.  I remember clearly sitting at an intersection between the nursing home and my puppy's home, realizing that I did not want to go to either "home".
I introduced Mom to Clio.  They didn't get on.  My mother died soon after.  Clio grew to be a wonderful soul.  The two are entwined in my mind, alpha and omega.  Maybe that is why I never got another dog.
Which brings me to the new beginnings.  My brother's family had a great bulldog, Dozer, that died early and unexpectedly.  They wrestled with the idea of getting a new dog.  They waited months and months.  Cody, the dark blob to the left, is a gentle beast of a chocolate lab.  He greeted the new bulldog, Tucker, with great good humor, even as Tucker treated Cody's ears as chew toys.  My grand nephew, Max also enjoys tussling with Tucker.  He is size appropriate.  Max was to be christened in New York City. So I went to Baltimore to babysit the puppy.  He's adorable , aside from his razor sharp teeth.  Still in housebreaking stage, he had to be carted out to the yard hourly.  He took exception to my policing of chewables.  I spent the day in near constant motion: ferrying him to the pee and poop zones, keeping him away from the duck pond, removing sticks, dead habiscus, and stones from his gullet.  It was a long day.  I'm so happy my brother has gotten a new puppy.  And that I don't want one.

Too Much Information Alert

  If I am known for anything, artistically speaking, it's as a food artist.  Clementines, mussels, raw chicken...I have painted them all with love.   I have a complicated relationship with food, loving it, apparently, to excess.  Painting it, writing about it, devouring it.  I looked forward to every meal of the day. "Five a day" fruits and veggies/whole grains/ high fiber was practically my religion. 
   I need a new religion.  I have lymphocytic colitis.  They don't know how to treat it other than to carpet-bomb the colon with steroids for three months.  My perky doctor told me I could expect 3 to 4 attacks a year.  (Do the math: 9 to 12 months a year on steroids.)  Usually I have a month between attacks. This last one came on after only a week and was particularly vicious.  My acupuncturist used this as further evidence of my spleen qi deficiency.  (Previous evidence, food cravings, heavy menstruation and bruising).  I could no longer ignore the diagnosis.  To build up qi and rid the 'dampness', she has banned all cold foods, fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, dairy products, garlic and onions, sweets, red meat and alcohol from my diet.  I'm left with white fish, chicken, rice, bananas and root vegetables that have boiled and beaten into a submissive mush.   How can I give up tomatoes? And arugula, and apples?
  She said I have to develop patience. I'm pretty much known for my impatience. But I'm trying.  I meditate and drink ginger tea.  And I wonder at the irony of being a food painter sustained by mush.