<$BlogRSDUrl$> This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?

Thursday, August 28, 2003

Pizza Day 
Remember pizza day at school? One of the only days I bought school lunch. The other lunch days I was strictly a peanut butter sandwich, apple and milk kinda gal. Not so much picky, just that I liked routine. My son? He's picky. My daughter? She will eat anything! Or at least be willing to try it once. She is an adventurer. Noah likes to know his situation. But what do they both agree on? That same rectangular pizza served up at school lunches across our great nation with the tiny containers of milk and that canned fruit cocktail. At 10:55am and 11:25am I will be eating lunch with my kids. A nice perk for working at home. Especially since they have to hear every other minute, "In a second baby, Mommy just has to finish this." I stop working when they get home, maybe taking occasional client calls. But then I work as soon as they are in bed. Most nights when they sleepily awake to use the bathroom or asked to be tucked back in, they find me in the office or in the living room painting with canvas and tubes of paint everywhere. They pretty much always see me working. I realized yesterday that seeing all this they may never ever want to work for themselves. It consumes you. You work every spare minute. You almost always think about work. A new marketing idea, getting the money for a new ad, calling connections, finding festivals, and then of course the actual painting with the occasional design job thrown in. And don't get me started about hunting down checks people owe you! (the design jobs, not my painting clients.) I work way more than 40 hours a week. But, the thing is, I LOVE it. Absolutely love it. And, while I may stay up until 1 or 2am most nights, in about 3 hours I will get to go have lunch with my kids, forget about the rest of the world for a while and focus all my attention on two of the coolest kids I know. Oh yeah, and eat some great rectangle pizza!

Wednesday, August 27, 2003

inspiration of the day... 
Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you've imagined. ~Thoreau

Once again I am reminded of my personal philosophy that the difference between those of us that achieve their dreams and those of us that don't is very, very simple. The ones that achieve success began to try. One day they decided to try. And the next day they decided to try again. Even the tiniest progress each day can be monumental at the end of a week, a month, a year. "You cannot fail if you do not stop trying." And my personal fave? "Life rewards action." And with that, I better go. Because these dogs aren't going to paint themselves and while I love computerland, it has been known to suck the productivity out of my day! "Action!", I constantly remind myself!

Now go have a beautiful day!


Tuesday, August 26, 2003

Frida 
I've never been a Selma Hayek fan. Actually, she's always irritated me. Not sure why, maybe it was that increadibly tiny waist??? (just kidding!) But then. I saw Frida. Isn't it funny how seeing an actor in a different role can make you love them? (happened with Nicholas Cage too.) I now love Selma! So the movie. It was my treat to myself last Friday night. I knew the moment it began I would fall in love with it. It opens in a Mexican courtyard. The colors. They were intoxicating. The walls were cobolt blue and the accents a deep barn red. And the cactus green. Oh the green! Look for this combo in a future painting! So I knew at once I was smitten. The movie. The woman. So much passion lived in her life. So much pain, both emotional and physical. I have never really studied her paintings. But now I know I am changed. Her artwork will be in my house. I have been influenced in the past by Mexican pottery with the bold colors they use. When we go to El Paso (my husband is Mexican-his whole family lives there) I love going to see the pink houses and all the green cypress trees, going over the border to see the painted pottery. I have a mexican tile that is right at my desk as I type because I love to look at the flower pattern on it. I want to paint my living room and dining room a warm terra cotta. Bring so much more color into my life. I try to be bright and vivid with my art, maybe that is why this movie touched me so much. The color, the passion. Frida lived her life on her terms and even in the most terrible moments, she never said she was sorry for who she was or how she lived. And the best part was it showed those moments. Her insecurities as an artist, always being humble, insisting she was not that good. But she always followed her her heart, even when it meant having it broken. And one of the best lines from the movie came from the character that played her husband Diego. He said, "If you are a painter you will paint. You will paint for the rest of your life because you must." Exactly.

Sunday, August 24, 2003

On Line Friends... 
One of life's simple, sweet pleasures for me is when we gt to see how very much alike we really all are. Last night I took my kids at 10pm to go to a planetarium to see Mars through a telescope with a 36 inch mirror. When we arrived the line was not too long. There I was with my two kids whom I teach as much astronomy as I can hoping one of them wiill one day be a great astronomer so I can live vicariously through them. (I was a physics major for 2 1/2 years before switching my degree to fine arts-yeah, that made daddy REALLY happy!) In front of me is a man with his two sons. We begin the friendly chit chat that strangers stuck on line do, making jokes about how this is educational for the kids but we both know we are really here for us. We then talk for the next 45 minutes getting to know each other as much as two strangers can while intermittedly picking up kids, putting down kids, telling kids that it is not much longer, breaking up fights and explaining that no, we will not die of thirst or heat on this line. We finally snake our way to the telescope, see Mars closer to the Earth right now than in all of recorded history and never to be this close again in our life time. It was magnificent - you could see the polar ice caps! And after this once in a life time event we simply turn to this stranger we just met with the same interests and say, "Nice talking to you, have a great rest of your weekend!" I love that. People being friendly because deep down we all really just want to be nice and have people be nice to us. At least that is how it works in my head - and I like it like that.

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?