Time With Dad

         

So, along the lines of the Bloom Where You're Planted post, I've found a few new blooms on the bush.  Some time with an old friend painting in the park was just the ticket last week.  Angela and I have been painting together for many years, since I moved here almost thirteen years ago.  She, a speedy oil painter alongside me, a slow watercolorist.  We both like to paint the same things and always enjoy each other's company.  But these last few years we haven't gotten to do it much at all.  Hopefully we can do this with some frequency since we both found a little time in our busy schedules.

It's funny, I had almost decided to just give art up entirely.  Gasp! Art for me has always been a joy and an outlet. Other times when I had a rough patch I may have quit painting for a time, but I never felt as though the artistic spirit had left.  Maybe it took a backseat, but I knew it would return, front and center.  And it always did.  Before.  It's hard to explain.  But as time dragged on and I just didn't enjoy it, I figured maybe it had run it's course.  That happens, right?  There are other things.  Pursuits and interests I haven't gotten to yet.  Maybe I would find a new passion?

So I resolved to just give it a year.  If, after a year (plus the past year) my attitude had not changed, I would just move on.  In the meantime, I didn't force it.  I left it alone almost entirely.  I have never done that in 25 or more years!  But I guess I needed a break.  And time. Time to give priority to other things. 

The second bloom to open was this recent nagging thought that I need to sketch and paint my dad.  One of the things I tell students is to paint what is around them.  Anything and everything!  Still, I really was in no mood to paint or sketch beyond my obligations until the last few months anyway. But time, that measurement of minutes, hours, days, months and years.  It changes things.  Time moves on and you can't stop it.  Once it's gone, it's gone.  I realized I had an opportunity in time.  Time with my dad.  How could I best use that time with my dad?  As I thought about that, it was pretty obvious what one of the opportunities here is!  Bingo! 

And so, as time marches on, I have so many opportunities.  Small gems hidden, barely visible.   The task is to mine these gems each and every day.  The other night, it was fishing.  I sketched him and painted as he watched my husband fish.  The painting was awful because of the paper in the journal I used, but what a time we had!  We roared with laughter while my husband "fished" his lure from a bush!  The other was a sketch done from a photo I snapped the other day because I loved the light against a dark window.  

So, as I think about fathers day I realize I've been given a gift. It's not the new inspiration or the art spirit come back that is the gift.  It is this time with my dad.