Driving home from 6 hours of running around on the North Dakota roads for simple errands that would have been done HOURS ago if we lived in a city, I made sure to call my mom to nurture our relationship and to help pass the time. While we were talking about homemade pizzas, John Grisham, hope, and existential dread, we found ourselves also in conversation about the wide-open skies.
One of the perks of living in the Peace Garden State is having a nearly 360-degree view of the sky at all times for miles and miles in any direction. You can see weather systems moving in and out, and you can watch clouds… You really don’t even have a choice if you are outside! (Side note: Ryan and I are thankful for this fact if we have children here. We are learning that looking at far away things in sunlight is critical for healthy eye development. Thank you North Dakota!)
It’s spring now and the clouds are making that fact evident. Huge cumulonimbus thunderheads loom around, many of them dissolving into whispy blobs as rain breaks free from their apparently solid structures. There are SO many different values in the sky.
After I said something to my mom about the pretty sky, my mom replied that she loves spring clouds and spring skies. It clicked in my mind that yes, this was a phenomenon unique to this time of the year and I was witnessing incredible fleeting beauty that I wanted to savor before summer comes and the moisture leaves us for expansive blue horizons and golden hills.
When I got home, I gave myself permission to skip a painting due to my exhaustion from being in the car. I ate dinner… Puttzed around… and then I gave a glance out our sliding door on our patio for inspiration. It wasn’t hard to become enthralled.
I quickly set up my easel, hands becoming cold and clammy already from the blowing wind, and set to work capturing the sky.
It took me 22 minutes from set up and mixing paints to putting on my final brush strokes. Just like that, there was the gorgeous scene in front of me, immortalized (as long as this gessoed chipboard holds up!) on my little 6×6 inch canvas. What gratifying work.
I’m working on better understanding my motivations for painting every day. Something about this habit is calling me home despite my best efforts to weasel out of the time it takes to keep up the routine. I want to keep this little flame of passion for oil painting alive. As I’m typing this, my best guess as to why I feel compelled to continue painting daily is that it is filling my need to document, journal, and have a means for reflection on my life. I am keeping a journal of sorts on each canvas of my emotions, beliefs, values, and deep longings in each painting session. I am also improving my skills at representing the beauty around me; the beauty that sometimes gives me a much-needed reason to smile and to hope for tomorrow.
If these paintings can sustain themselves (financially, emotionally, time-wise) AND inspire others to feel some hope, gratitude, and respite as they encounter a painting… I think I could do this for the rest of my life. Dying with a nice portfolio of work that inspires beauty and awe for those who come to sounds like such a meaningful way to leave the world.