Heavy Sigh While Laboring One Last Time Over Sunflowers

No matter how much fun we're having during the Labor Day holiday, there's a cloud floating overhead carried along by the cool breezes whispering, "Enjoy yourself today, winter's on the way." The next holiday, we'll be wearing parkas here in Michigan as we follow behind children shouting,"Trick or Treat." Yuk. Heavy sigh.

On the bright side: My stubborn, Capricorn nature sent me back into yesterday's sunflowers with markers and acrylics. A sense of tangibility seems to be a quality I need--no doubt due to my ties to sculpture and construction. Also strong contrasts are pleasing, due to a lifetime of being nearsighted. Watercolor, the way I've been doing it, doesn't give me those satisfactions.

When I told Honey how inferior I felt to other art bloggers, he said, as he opened a bottle of champagne to go with our BLT lunch, "Why, at your age, do you want to bang your head against the wall learning a new medium and working in small sizes when you're so good at what you've been doing all along?" He motioned towards my twelve by seven foot painting hanging on the great room wall. He's such a good guy, my honey. And he had a point. I have been influenced by all of the wonderful work I've seen online and just having to come up with a drawing a day has made me go small and paint whatever subject that's handy.

Nevertheless, this morning I got into it again after reading a wonderful book I picked up a few years back: A Passion for Water Color; Painting The Inner Experience, by Stefan Draughon. The "inner experience" got me. I got out my no nonsense watercolor tubes and Archer 140 lb.cold press pad. There's was going to be no fooling around, I was going to do it right--and the painting came out okay. Still a bit overdone, but a step closer to the sketch-like feeling I'd admire in watercolor.