That title makes little sense if you didn’t see a post I made a few days ago about spending an hour looking for a particular pen because I wanted to use it to write something. So I’ll back up a bit and then fill you in on things.
First off, I’ve been on vacation from the day job this week. I usually take the last week of April, that includes the last few days of April and first couple of days of May, off from the day job. Most of the time it ends up being a staycation, though two years ago my awesome sister treated me to a trip to Paris. Well, she covered the flight, we split the rest. It was still awesome. We thought about making another trip this year but with the state of things right now, we decided not to.
Anyway. This week has been a staycation. I have several administrative things I need to do and more than a few pieces of art I want to work on and that’s what I planned on doing. And then, Sunday morning I woke up and saw on one of the socials that the museum in the city was just opening an exhibit of the work of Annie Leibovitz. After some research and deciding that Tuesday would be a better day to go, I planned to sit down and do some of the planning work I wanted to do. But, I wanted a specific pen for the work, because I do like to do that type of work with pen and paper. Problem was that I couldn’t find the pen. I could see it in my head, I knew I’d seen it recently but where. I spent an hour looking for it, maybe more.
By the time I reluctantly gave up actively looking for the pen, I’d shifted into thinking about some of the cleaning I needed to do and decided to start with the one place that I knew exactly what needed to be removed and cleaned and organized. The balcony storage. Yes, the balcony that tends to have wasp issues. It felt really good to get that all cleared out, even if most of it sits behind a closed door. I think as much as our things exist in the physical world, they also take up space in our head, and cleaning out things can be a bit like clearing out the brain. It’s nice.
I did go to the museum on Tuesday. I really dislike driving in the city here, and parking is a nightmare, and expensive. Even with that, I decided that I needed to make the effort to go because, well, it would be a bit of a treat for myself. And it was. I didn’t really think I was that unusual in regards to the things I’ve paid attention to over the years. But perhaps I was more in tune with some things than I realized. I say this because I’ve mentioned the Annie Leibovitz exhibit to a few people and then had to explain to them who she is. Anyway, I got something from going that I can’t quite explain. I suppose some would call it inspiration, that’s not it as far as how I experience inspiration. It also wasn’t quite motivation. Whatever it was, I’m really glad I went. And for those of you who might not know who Annie Leibovitz is she’s a photographer and has taken some iconic and amazing photos, and portraits, think Rolling Stones, and Rolling Stone magazine, Vanity Fair, and Vogue.
In addition to the administrative stuff that I had planned for the week, that it took me a few days to actually get started on, my plans for the week included working on some art. Which I have done. That flower piece? I’ve worked on it and made some really good progress. The build of the color is down and now it’s time to work the details. I’m actually really happy with it so far. The other piece I have ready to be worked on is the next taekwondo painting. I have had to fiddle with an area or two a few times and finally have things right enough to start paint. It’s both exciting and nerve racking.
Now to finding the pen. I was looking for something else today, some papers I want for an appointment coming up. In the course of looking for them I managed to do my filing and a bit of tidying of my desk. Both are feats of proportion. This lead me to something else that lead to something else and in the process, as I cleaned reminder notes off my desk there it was. The pen. Sitting in plain sight. I guess sometimes, what we are looking for really is right in front of us if we can only see it.
It’s ok, I didn’t expect to get philosophical in this post either. I really just wanted to give a quick update and say hello. I’m off to do more painting, administrative work, and get ready for a trip to the photographer to drop off some artwork.
Cheers