I’ve always loved how this abstract I painted reminds me of a treasure map.
Because I’ve been having some deep and delicious ponderings lately about PURPOSE, both in midlife (40-60 years) as well as purpose in the Fourth Quarter.
If I were asked to name the ache I hear most often from women my age, it might be this:
“I’m not sure what or who I’m here for anymore.”
Roles shift. We’ve become astonishingly competent at things we’re no longer entirely sure we want to keep doing.
And so we try to manufacture new “purpose.”
But manufactured purpose feels…um…manufactured.
Contrived. Ugggggggh. (As an artist, both copy and contrivance is anathema to me…I HATE it.)
What if, instead of copy or contrivance, we looked at our ACTUAL life (versus “wished for” life) as an opportunity for a cartography-related session of evidence gathering?
Friend -
I need to tell you where I’ve gone.
Not far. Not away from you. Just…elsewhere. I’ve begun writing on Substack and I want to tell you why, because the why matters more than the announcement.
There is a particular pleasure in opening a box of Christmas ornaments.
Something you haven’t held in nearly a year is suddenly in your hands again. You turn it toward the light. You remember who gave it to you, where you found it, or the Christmas when it first belonged to your home.
I love making things that become part of that returning.
For years, I’ve created and sold hand-painted artisan ornaments. Each one gets my full attention: layered color, metallic dimension, passages of soft pastel, and a ribbon chosen to finish the story.
You’ve asked me to teach them. Again and again. Now I’m delighted to invite you into
Small Wonders: A Painterly Ornament Workshop.