How I spent the last day of 2010

'Frozen Slough' digital photo; Kathleen Faulkner

We took our time and drove the Bayview road.  

The sun was shining and the air was cold.  We spent too much time in Edison.  It always happens.  There are people to see and time to spend. 

It was late when we left.  The cold winter sun was going down fast.  As we headed home we noticed the slough, frozen top layer left high and dry when the tide receded. I stood there listening to the groaning and cracking sounds of the ice giving it up to gravity.

Later, good food, good friends, hopeful toasts.

We can make this new year anything we want.   

'An eye for an eye will make us all blind' Mahatma Gandhi

This is the season of love and joy.  We are different:  as we wish our friends a Merry Christmas we are full of good cheer.  We give to charity and think of others.  We do good deeds.

Small things make us cry.   It seems as though we become the people that we've been waiting for.

Maybe this Solstice Full Moon Lunar Eclipse will have a hand in changing the time frame.  Maybe we will carry on the love and joy and peace from now until forever.  It is my wish for us all.


Happy Solstice, full moon lunar eclipse, Merry Christmas, Yule, Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, HumanLight and Diwali to all   and to all a good life
 in Peace.

Solstice: full moon lunar eclipse

'Nightscape' 12x12" oil and soft pastel, charcoal;
Kathleen Faulkner

Winter Solstice:
Out of the darkness  we move toward the light

This 'holiday' really works for me.  Just knowing that we will now be moving away from the darkest hour gives me hope and brightens dark places.

This year, there is a full moon lunar eclipse during the Solstice, an event that we have never seen in our lifetime and will never see again.  A once in a lifetime opportunity to make it anything we want and a chance to move forward with a little help from the Universe.  That puts a smile on my face.

Happy Solstice, Friends!  May we move forward with love and peace and inspiration,  Cheers!

The Winter of it

'The Winter of It' oil and soft pastel, charcoal; 8x8"
Kathleen Faulkner

It is the Winter of it.  Darkness, rain  and the mentally ill.  

I think about a painting I did.  Title:  'It's Good to Have a Running Start'.
It is hard to have a running start in the Winter of it.  Friends are falling and Life is challenging.  I'm giving things away.  It helps.

It will soon be the Solstice.  Then, the days will grow longer and we will move toward Spring,  the favored season.  Then we shall all carry on.

'The Winter of It III' oil and soft pastel, charcoal; 8x8"
Kathleen Faulkner

Trees: 1 Neighbors: 0

'Morning' 23x21" oil pastel; Kathleen Faulkner

It's been pouring rain.  My property is soaked.  My walkway is underwater.  I live on a hill so flooding is not something I worry about too much.  The wind uprooting my trees when the ground is so saturated is the bigger concern. 

I live in a neighborhood that does not appreciate trees.  They distract from the potential view that some neighbors are intent upon having.  I've been begged, shamed, cajoled and threatened but to no avail.

There are two things that would do the trick.  My death and/or a major windstorm.  I've lived here through several wind storms of historic proportions but still the wind is always able to make me nervous.  In the end, though, it will probably be my demise that will seal their fate.  

So, for now, here's a toast to my excellent Tree Friends:  May you live and grow forever and may I live a very long life. 

The morning after

digital photo; Kathleen Faulkner

I wake to winter sunshine.  The frost lingers.  I've been working for months, intensely,  but today I can breathe.  I am free, I can do anything.   

Should I clean my house, workshop, yard?  Should I go for a long walk and take photos?  Should I visit friends that I've neglected all this time?  For an instant, I feel at a loss for what to do: my focus is confused.  I could keep doing what I've been doing:  I have three panels ready to paint,  a couple commissions, some jewelry I could finish but it seems a waste to let a beautiful day slip by while I'm indoors.  I have time on my side for once.

I guess I'll go with the flow and see where it takes me.

'Near Edison'  digital photo;  Kathleen Faulkner

The story I told the tree

'False Pass'  oil and soft pastel, charcoal;
Kathleen Faulkner

There are several garbage islands out in the oceans. These are huge masses of plastic where nothing lives except previously owned stuff, re-morphed into garbage that will last forever and that the fish and birds and animals eat because it looks like food.

It's all made from oil and contributes to our potential doom.

Of course, there are other ingredients in the doom recipe: global warming, pesticides, radiation, clear cutting and the destruction of whole ecosystems to feed humans' need for stuff.   There are many more, too many to mention.

Everyone that has something to sell hopes that someone will buy it.  I am an artist.  I create work because  it fulfills me and it supports me.  It's still stuff.  I often have conflicts about it all.  We all contribute to the doom recipe but less really is more and, as much as I can justify Art as a quality of life necessity, it still requires materials, some more destructive than others, to make it.  I wonder if I have any right to feel that what I do is worthwhile.  Maybe I'm just using resources for my own selfishness. 

Recently a friend read this story to me:  Global Warming and Art

It changed my perspective a bit and eased the angst.