Now that the craft fair is over and I’ve recuperated physically and regrouped mentally, I’ve been adding a bit of metallic color with the charcoal pieces I’m reworking. #11, above is the first one I finished and I am much happier with it now. In the meantime, I am also reworking paintings from last summer’s solo show by using what I’ve learned about negative space and black while doing the charcoal pieces. Oskar, below, used to have a vivid purple background but now has one that is a mix of dark blues and browns that passes for black but isn’t. This is all part of the necessary growth and exploration of making art, each phase leads to and informs the next. Yes, they are still birds, my spirit animals, my talismans, but there is a definite advancement even though the earliest ones were quite, dare I say it, brilliant too. Brilliant is a word Paul, my fiancé, uses. Our relationship is based on our appreciation of each other’s artwork. We’ve been Facebook friends for at least fifteen years but it developed into a romance in 2023. At the time I was intimidated by him and his career even though I was more prolific and visible on social media. Almost a mentor, he guided me as I built both my website and craft fair business as well as a solid body of original paintings. He has brought a gravity and stature to my work, and he’s patient with me if he feels I’m headed in a wrong direction. He tells me, of course, but patiently, especially when I disagree with him. Although once I catch up with what he has been suggesting, I see it too. You’d have to ask him how I’ve influenced his work, but to my eye there’s a bounce and joy that wasn’t there before. It’s a win-win situation, he has given me confidence and I have brought light into the gloom and despair of what is currently our world. How will the Venezuela nightmare impact our plans? Will the UK have me with my American passport? Will whatever I ship there arrive or get blown out of the water? What about flying? I know I’m not getting on a plane or going through an airport again until things calm down. But will they calm down? I keep thinking about people who were separated during WWII and could only connect with letters that took months to arrive. At least we have Zoom and WhatsApp, for now. Onward.