WORD PAINTINGS #131 - UNCOMPETITIVE PURPOSEFULNESS!

 

        "NOCHECITA" (Trujillo Road - Llano Quemado, New Mexico) New! 8"x10" Original Oil

WORD PAINTINGS #131 (How I Came to New Mexico and learned about Art and Life!) - UNCOMPETITIVE PURPOSEFULNESS!!!

30 April 2023 - Saying Farewell to winter and "Hola" to Spring!  It is a quiet Sunday morning here on Llano Quemado.  Woke up with a long "to do" list running through my brain until I remembered that I have given myself a weekly reprieve for this "day of rest". 

It has been a month since writing about the dicey stay in the ER at Holy Cross last September.  Many days focusing on "mortality" and "retirement".  Finally decided that sometimes the difference between staying alive and brain death are small daily choices.  This isn't a fight I wanted to have at my age. From the time I was a young child, my only purpose was to raise my children and paint.  There it is - PURPOSE!!!  Rather than plop around in my own thoughts of perpetual darkness, I decided to take out this ad in the Taos Gallery Guide, believing that Centinelas de Oro was one of my best canvases to come off the easel!

 

About this time last year I decided to leave my gallery and just wing it again.    Having done this before, it was a little scary.  In this process I remembered all the other times I felt like a "cash cow" and walked away from the hype.  This has always been my way of maintaining artistic integrity and a healthy creative life . Turned down a sure sale because it was absolutely necessary for me to sit with this painting for a year before deciding to let it go. Hoped with all my heart this work could stay in Taos where it belonged!

Buying this ad renewed my self-confidence and PURPOSE!  Within a day of its publication the painting was "adopted" by a local family just down the road. The man had visited my studio on Santistevan Lane over 30 years ago, but waited for his perfect piece. He and his wife had decided that this was "the one" before they ever set foot in my studio! We three hugged and cried.  Told them it felt like a "divine appointment"!   My spark was lit one more time! 

Now what??? Later next month I will celebrate my 37th year of sobriety thanks to all my angels and helpers along the way.  My sponsors drummed into my head that life needs to be lived One Day at a Time!  Who can do that when a hundred images run through your head - empty canvases as far as my mind can see!  Well, here I am where time matters and I need to make creative choices on a daily basis.  It turns out that my choice to be on my own again was a solid decision because I no longer feel the need to
compete and am free to choose what to paint one day at a time.  This might be called a late in life New Beginning- a new adventure! Amazing Grace....DC