Attention all those who have had chicken pox.... you might want to get the shingles shot, as I now have the shingles and it is most definitely NOT fun.  Medical professionals say that most who get shingles are over 60 years old, but this 55 year old certainly wishes she had been immunized against it.  If you even think you might possibly have shingles, taking anti-virals immediately is supposed to be helpful.

I am hoping to feel better soon, so that I can resume work on my book.  Until then, rest, sleep and play on the computer!

Another peaceful day today, listening to the rain outside my window while working on illustrating the next two pages of my book.  I think it would be nice to put a bird feeder outside that window and maybe a butterfly garden along the fence.

"I am a traveler passing through the earth, as all my fathers were."

Psalm 39:12

The Art Collection of Jonathan Green and Richard Weedman

is currently on display at the Gibbs Museum in Charleston.  One Thursday per month, 

both Mr. Green and Mr. Weedman conduct a tour of the collection they have shared with us.

My daughter and I, along with about 100 others, filled the main upstairs gallery, full of

anticipation.  Jonathan Green is my favorite contemporary artist, with many of his works hanging in my home.  His pictures are calm and peaceful, yet infinitely joyful. They make me stop and smile each and every time that I pass them.   His and his partner Richard's peace and joy is shown in the collection on display- how lucky we were to hear both men describe their art and life journeys, their  passion towards life and their deep biblical spirituality expressed in art.  

Both men discussed their long quest to preserve and possess the art created by the WPA government artists in the 1930's.  As much as I've read about the WPA, I have somehow missed the story of the artists who were paid by the US government to create, paint and sculpt; a huge blessing which was blotted out when influential art galleries despaired about a perceived glut on the art market caused by the huge amount of art created.  The government's response was to destroy all government owned art from that period.  The art that was privately or gallery owned was saved, yet most of the saved works ended up in garage sales and antique shops.  Jonathan Green and Richard Weedman have been on a life quest to rescue this art...Bravo to you both!

What better way to fill a day during the first week of "ma vie recommence" experience than to see a French film?  Well.....here's my take on Amour:

Talk, talk, talk, eat very noisily, talk, talk, have a stroke.

Smoke, chase a pigeon, have another stroke, 

Alienate your family, smother your spouse with a pillow,

Barricade yourself in your apartment and die.

Cheery flick.  Gotta love French films, though.  Pretty gutsy.

Carving out a peaceful place to work and grow today.  I think it will be one baby step after another when it comes to creating a distance between past tensions and future life.  

Baby step number one....working on the illustrations for my second book, and shifting my thoughts during the day to that.  I have the next two pages in my head, which is becoming a less cluttered place.

Baby step number two...I watched fat drops of rain swell on the ends of the black tree branches in my front yard.  They grew, elongated, disappeared down into the grass and started over again in a new place on the branch.

My Life Begins Again....

At age 55, I begin to live for myself..not for an employer, not for those I love, who are many but for pure joy and beauty and the expansion of my universe, as I know it.   And now, life.