Heading home after a day of painting, I have the hope of seeing the moon rising over St. Mick's church. It's one of those little visual treats. I always think of my friend, Ronnie, who texts me moon alerts on how beautiful it is each full-moon evening. This morning the moon was full and bright at 6 AM in the Western sky but it was nine degrees out and a muffin was waiting for me in the studio. My day is starting great, and I'm sure Ronnie is still warm in bed. Should I text her a morning moon alert? Parking the car, I check which pocket my studio key is in. I don't want to be fumbling around freezing my hand searching the six pockets for the keys. Adrienne, my friend in Arkansas, has probably been in her bakery for a couple hours already. My so-called smart phone keeps me posted on where my friends may be freezing.
Warming up with my cocoa and muffin, I think about last night's news and the reporting on how likely it is that Russia would be invading Ukraine. I check Facebook right away to see how my artist friend in Ukraine is doing. Her paintings are beautiful and they express her feelings for her homeland. People waiting in the snow for a city bus, is one subject she has done. Another is of a couple kissing. Her young son, sitting with a newborn calf, is beautifully painted. Through her art I feel life in her Ukraine. My artist friends in Russia, I am wondering, are they out painting a scene of cows grazing behind a country church? It's winter there too, so they are braving the cold to capture a winter farm scene. A hardy group who meets all challenges.
Over the years artists around the world have shown me quiet corners of the globe. An old woman sits in her kitchen in a country town in Argentina, peeling potatoes in one artist's painting, while an old woman stands holding a hoe in her American garden in another painting. Good times radiating, I am invited into an Australian country watering hole. Headlights and red taillights show people dodging cars in a Johannesburg's rain storm, while cowboy is unsaddling his horse at the end of a long day in Wyoming. A girl, holding her breath as water and air bubbles swirl about, in her blue underwater Florida playground. A barber applies his skills on a street in Delhi, India and men race a sailboat off Long Island. A woman with a battered face, a boy with a bloody nose. Artists show us the world around us - the good, the bad, and the ugly. I would like to say we keep the bad and ugly out of our studio, but truth finds us as we paint .
