Life has felt a bit like a rushing river lately, with our house selling very quickly (two full price offers in the first five days), then an extended time of inspections and negotiations that I will confess I did not handle well at all. I felt like I was teetering on a precipice, struggling for solid ground (all the while, aware of how grateful I should feel — and did feel, really — for such a quick couple of offers). After a rather punitive inspection report, offers and counteroffers flew fast and furiously until we came to agreement. Papers were signed, and we could relax into the next stage of the journey of moving home to the island.
I have to say that I am proud of myself for not falling back into old patterns of emotional overeating while stressed. I did do some binge-mystery-novel reading (rereading most of my beloved Louise Penny / Inspector Gamache novels), but at least binge-reading doesn’t leave me feeling like a slug lost in a carbohydrate haze.
I decided to give last weekend over to making a gift for Heron House (our island home), a painting of a heron in flight, to hang over the fireplace. Herons have been sacred to me since I moved to the Northwest in 1990. They carry the energy of grace and beauty (even with that raucous squawk), of calm and repose, of being a sentinel and a guardian. But even more than that — because of heron appearances at pivotal moments in my life — Heron carries the energy of the Divine Feminine, the Lady of the Sacred Waters. When I see a heron, it’s like a message from Her, saying: “I’m here. You’re on the right path. I’ve got your back.”
Our island house is close to a slough that runs into the bay and when I first started visiting the island in the mid-90s, herons would always be there to greet me. And so it seemed natural, when we built our house in 2000, to name it Heron House.
(When I drove out to the island in mid-March to work in my garden there — when we thought we were putting the island house up for sale — I saw a heron flying west over downtown Bellingham. Headed for the island, calling me home.)
So last weekend I bought a big canvas (big for me anyway — 24”x30”) and got my acrylic paints out of storage. I had an absolutely splendid day on Saturday, standing at my floor easel, adding texture on top of the gesso, then painting the background in luscious tones of cerulean and indigo blue. I turned the tunes up high on my iPod (Michael Franti! Ruthie Foster! Eric Bibb! Eliza Gilkyson!) and began dancing as I painted. Sheer unadulterated joy.
I turned around once late in the afternoon and gasped to see a perfect rainbow alight on the heart of the heron. (We have prisms that hang in high clerestory windows, that fill the room with rainbows on sunny afternoons.) It seemed like magic to me. The rainbow moved and faded after a few minutes, but its essence remained, becoming part of the layers of paint and canvas.
I got up early on Sunday morning, excited to start the next phase of the painting. I began to layer yellow ochre and terra cotta over the blue background, intending the complementary colors to give it a dynamism and texture. Up close, that’s exactly what happened — it looked gorgeous!
But from far away, it looked like green gooey mud.
I was so disappointed.
So I took it back to blue, then added in more gold, and again, really disliked how it looked.
I ended the first day in joy and the second day in despondency.
It didn’t escape me that this emotional pattern was very similar to my experience of selling the house. (And once again, I avoided overdosing on carbs and sweets.)
I have spent 30 years working on small, detailed pieces (in pen-and-ink and colored pencil). I have a lot to learn about painting big. And this is only the second acrylic painting I’ve ever done. I don’t know yet all the foibles and intricacies of painting with acrylics. Time to go back to basics and learn a bit more about technique.
So Monday afternoon, after a busy morning and a lovely midday break spent nurturing myself by lazing in the noontime sun, I picked up my palette and loaded it with gesso.
And just like that, we have a fresh start and a new beginning. All the layers of what came before add richness and complexity, the past making the present all the more beautiful.
I love the opportunity, always, to begin again.
“Ours is not a caravan of despair. Come, even if you have broken your vows a thousand times. Come, yet again, come.” — Rumi
I adore Ruthie Foster. This is gorgeous.
Thanks Arwen. Eliza Gilkyson is from Texas, too. Your state has given birth to some of my favorite musicians. 🙂
Well, that’s just perfect. A pentimento. You changed your mind about which house you were going to sell; which place was going to be “home.” And as you honor that decision, you are changing your mind about Heron’s background (resting place). You will know when it’s right, just as you know Heron House is right. And all that went before will reside with you and in you, and give you (and Heron) your unique texture. We are pentimenti, all of us.
Hah. You are brilliant, my friend. I love thinking of it this way. Pentimenti. Thank you.
Oh, Joanna, what a beautiful tapestry you also weave with your words! Because we’re also in the midst of a move, I was right there with you, listening (reading) as your story, and your painting unfolded before my eyes. I’ve never been an artist of the canvas, and feel blessed to be a part of your every evolving creation. There was a moment in one of the versions of your painting, when it seemed the background was a dark blue marble with golden strands enmeshed. Yet, the simplicity (to the eye) of how your painting was reborn with your journey through this time, speaks greater volumes still. OH! an I absolutely LOVE the name, Heron House, for the name of your home! 🙂
May the Light shine always warm upon your Hearth!
Blessed Be!
Thank you Joan! Blessings back to you!
Joanna, I LOVE watching your painting come to life and even that you are willing to start it over–although I have to say I gasped with joy when I first saw it. So………………when and if you make prints, please let me know. A heron lived last summer close to our little home and she spoke often to me, too–now I know she was saying, “I’ve got your back,” and I needed that message so much right now!!!
Much love and blessings, Katie
Thank you Katie!
Thank you so much for sharing your artistic process! I always need to be reminded that it takes so many interim steps to come to a finished pictures.
Thanks Nancy! What kind of artwork do you do? Blessings.
Right now I’m mostly playing around multimedia art journaling. I’m taking an online course from Tamara LaPorte at willowing.org. I’m excited about making my tarot journal more multimedia.