Day 119

Something amazing happened today: I finished an oil painting.  I enjoy starting oil paintings, but I don't get around to finishing many of them.  I usually only find the time, motivation, and energy to oil paint about twice a year, so you can see why it's slow going.  I start a painting, and once I get around to wanting to paint again, I no longer am interested in painting what I started six months ago, so I start something new. But this time I finished. Here it is:

My brother took a picture of this poppy last summer, and I fell in love with that picture from the moment I saw it.  It is the desktop background on my laptop, and now it is forever captured in oil on canvas. I love the vivid colors and the elegant simplicity. It's a reminder that beauty is everywhere if you know how to see it.  That's why I wanted to paint it, and that's why I finished it.

There's something relaxing about oil painting, the smell of paint mixed with linseed oil and paint thinner.  The knowledge that I can never make a mistake that can't be fixed by another layer of paint.  The quietness and the creating.  Why don't I do it more?  I ask myself that everytime I get out my brushes and palette, and yet, I still only do it every once in a long while.  Maybe one day I'll find more time, and yet, maybe oil painting will always be my little retreat from the world, a place to rest my soul every once in a while, a joy that is only needed in small doses to be effective.

May you find joy in creating.