the yard flowers

i just picked up the old oil paints.  i haven't painted anything since before i was pregnant with jude.  that's 8 years. that is a long time. 

but i got the itch.  i felt like i needed to remember that part of myself.  that creative part that has to look at something, and try to make it.  i felt like i needed to sit and pay attention to the small details of the light and shadows and the colors and the shapes.  the thing about words is that they are easier.  i can write about anything- i can reach all of the senses.  but painting is limited- you can only say something that speaks to the eyes.  i wanted that challenge.  i wanted to remember how it feels to make your hand move in a way that gets the shape, and i wanted to remember how hard it is to keep the colors pure when the oil paint is wet.  so i dismantled a cardboard box, dug some paint thinner out of the shed and began to unseal the old paints.  i sat on my porch and i looked at the flowers in my yard.  they are so beautiful.  i couldn't make them- but i enjoyed trying.

it was hard.  it was frustrating.  it wasn't exactly like riding a bike, not that i was ever very good at it, but it was fun.  and it felt good except that i got a headache.  so maybe next time i'll try acrylic paints, maybe next time i won't use a cardboard box (see the stripes). maybe next time i'll be able to get my hands and my eyes to work better together. 

sometimes we have something inside of us that needs to come out, someway. 
this is how it came out today.