White on White

It was snowing so hard this morning, the air looked like it was covered in a thick layer of fog.  I didn't want to get up, but I did anyway. Now, everything is white white white. White on white. Now, I see blue sky. Reminds me the unpredictable Dothan weather I know so well.

My cat likes to sleep on piles of clean clothes all day long and then at night she turns into some weird monkey-like squirrel creature and destroys anything that hangs or dangles. 

I'm practicing getting up early so I can see through Gabe's eyes for a little bit. Since then, I haven't gotten a headache (a whole two days, really). This is a breakthrough for me.

I've been eating way too many potato things for meals lately. They're just so yummy. Last night I cooked Rösti (pronounced Rooshtie, and it consists of basically what we know as hash-browns) with onions, Guerre cheese (however you spell that) and bacon.  

To die for. I like to think I'm a good cook.

Wednesdays are G's short days at work, so we're going to get out this afternoon and hopefully throw some snow balls at each other.  We were grocery shopping yesterday and the wind was blowing so hard I felt like Dorothy in the tornado.  The door to the gallery house was open (the gallery house is where G and I are having an art show in April) and I had never seen the inside before. We went in to take a look and it's three stories high with big giant columns and intimidating empty, white walls. We have 8 weeks before the show and I have hardly anything ready at this point. When it's cold, and so beautifully white outside, I have a hard time painting. 

I've been feeling frustrated at my lack of productivity in the tangible facet of art lately. Most of my work has been sitting at the computer building my website or coming up with new post-processes for my photography work. It sits in my machine and hides from the world until I bring it forth. I'm planning on putting some fine art photography work in the show, I just don't know which pieces I should choose. They'll have to be reprinted because all the originals are still in America being pretty on someone's wall.

I did sketch around with some watercolor and made this:

I'm thinking about doing a series of these kinds of watercolors and use the style to integrate my abstract approach to painting. This is the last painting I finished which now hangs in our kind of ginormous bathroom. (size of photo doesn't represent actual size of painting... if I did, I'd be mega talented and could sell my artwork to little people.) 

                                          

My goal is to finish 5 or so of these paintings, modeled around the planets and the way we perceive the colors of the gas in their atmosphere.  Jupiter and Mars already belong to someone back in the states, so I'll either re-create those or skip them altogether. The more I think about what I want to exhibit, the more I change my mind. I'll probably come up with something new tomorrow. I am forced to work mega fast because of the way the painting is done, so this is a realistic goal. 

Pushing the paint around is a great way to disappear into another world for a little while: a world where there is such warm sunshine that sweat drips from your pours...a world where I have friends that speak English as their first language, where I have a car that I can drive to the store, where I get to see my mother everyday. To go to that world, just for a little while, is all I need to begin... and Gabriel, my Love, and his unconditional love and adoration for me, helps me finish.  I love how G stands over my shoulder and watches... how he doesn't say anything for a moment or two... but I know what he's thinking.

I cannot convey the sheer magnitude of awesome it is to have your husband look at your work and see it as an artist sees it. Unbiased and honest, with a side of endearment and potatoes.