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Archive for the ‘Art’ Category

The Blahs

Posted in Art, Journeys, Writing, tagged on March 17, 2016| 11 Comments »

      “The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance; the wise grows it under his feet.” James Oppenheim

While it's been sunny outside, the past two weeks have been dark and overcast in my head. -- By Pat Bean

While it’s been sunny outside, the past two weeks have been dark and overcast in my head. — By Pat Bean

I have a Case

I have always been a high-energy kind of person, one who thrives on ending a day with a feeling of accomplishment. A good day for me has always been one in which I have completed a project or activity and learned something new.

But perhaps the sun came out today. -- By Pat Bean

But perhaps the sun came out today. — By Pat Bean

Of course I’ve had days that have been eaten up by computer games, non-stop reading or television (more the first two than the latter), but they have mostly been singular in nature with better days in between. And I don’t begrudge the reading days because I count them as learning days.

This blah episode, however, has stretched into two weeks, which accounts for the absence of recent blogs.

I’ve been sitting here this morning, curled up in a blanket in my recliner with my morning coffee and my laptop, searching for answers to the dilemma — because accomplishing nothing for days on end does not make me a happy person.

First I gave myself credit for things I did accomplish just before this case of the blahs set in. I finished my fourth rewrite of Travels with Maggie, submitted a flash fiction piece to a contest and took on a new doggie baby-sitting client. The latter means I now have three dogs to walk every day. While that uses up an extra bit of time and energy it’s not that much. And besides, the extra walking is good for me. So scratch that excuse.

Perhaps I’m dawdling because I’m anxious about taking the next step on my travel book? That actually sounds possible.

And then, there’s the unrelated fact that today is St. Patrick’s Day – the time of year when my mother died. She actually died on a Friday the 13th, with her memorial service on St. Patrick’s Day. I still miss her, but I don’t think she’s the cause of my blahs. I mean I didn’t realize it was this time of year until today.

Perhaps I just needed some time off — and perhaps writing this blog means I’m ready to get back to being myself. I certainly hope so.

Blog pick of the Day. Check it out.

Blog pick of the Day. Check it out.

Bean Pat: My Beautiful Things http://tinyurl.com/jvf5h8e Relax and take a walk through the woods to the beach from your armchair.

 

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You Call That What?

Posted in Art, Journeys, tagged , on February 20, 2016| 1 Comment »

“Abstract painting is abstract. It confronts you. There was a reviewer a while back who wrote that my pictures didn’t have any beginning or any end He didn’t mean it as a compliment, but it was.” – Jackson Pollock

The End of the Cold War, a watercolor I painted when the Berlin Wall fell.

The End of the Cold War, a watercolor I painted when the Berlin Wall fell.

Abstract Art

The above painting wasn’t meant to be abstract art, but a lot of people see it that way. I painted it back when the Berlin Wall came down, and titled it “The End of the Cold War.”

cheeta, abstract 1          It’s an imperfect flower poking its way up through rusting mortar rockets designed for warfare.

It’s one of my favorite paintings, and currently hangs above my bed.

The photograph below, whose hue has been doctored a bit, was inspired by a blog post I read this morning. http://tinyurl.com/z9u2nr8 The post, Travel Theme: Abstract, suggested readers post their own abstract photography. I loved the blogger’s examples and went hunting through my own photos to see what I could find. As I looked, I also glanced up at the painting in my bedroom – and thought it fit the theme as well.

The untouched photo on the left is simply a small section of a photograph I took of a cheetah in Tanzania, and the doctored photograph below is simply river water.

A River of a different hue. -- Photo by Pat Bean

A River of a different hue. — Photo by Pat Bean

Now go find your own abstract art – and if you like, tell me about it.

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The List

Posted in Art, Journeys, tagged on February 9, 2016| 7 Comments »

“Why can’t somebody give us a list of things that everybody thinks and nobody says, and another list of things that everybody says and nobody thinks? – Oliver Wendell Holmes

While writing is usually aways at the top of my daily priority list, piddling with my art jumps around on the list. -- Painting by Pat Bean

While writing is usually aways at the top of my daily priority list, piddling with my art jumps around on the list. — Painting by Pat Bean

It Works for Me

This is the first year in my many, many years of making New Year’s Resolutions that come February, or sometimes just the second day of January, in which I haven’t broken one or all of those promises I made to myself.

And sometimes it's a bird outing that gets the No. I priority. -- Sketch by Pat Bean

And sometimes it’s a bird outing that gets the No. I priority. — Sketch by Pat Bean

This year I made only one resolution, and I haven’t broken it yet. That’s probably because I finally wised up and decided to make a resolution that I truly thought. I could keep. That’s it’s also one that has improved my productivity is even better.

The resolution is simply a promise to myself that I would start every day off with a fresh to-do list, and then prioritize my goals for the day. I do this now while drinking my morning coffee. While I don’t always finish everything on the list, the most important things usually do get accomplished.

It seems like such an easy resolution, but it works for me. And it worked for Annie Dillard, who wrote that “A schedule is a net for catching days.”

First Lady Michelle Obama advises us women to do a “better job of putting ourselves higher on our own lists.” I’ve taken that advice to heart as well, giving in to the whim occasionally that my daily to-do list No. 1 priority is to be lazy or just read for a day. Writing it down has meant that I lose the guilt such a day has always brought, then find that I accomplish more than usual the next day.

I guess I’m finally learning to listen to what my body, as well as my mind, wants.

Only 325 more days to go to complete my New Year’s Resolution.

Blog pick of the Day. Check it out.

Blog pick of the Day. Check it out.

Bean Pat: Bees and Flowers http://tinyurl.com/hebwqhw This is one of my favorite photography blogs.

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Art: American Bittern

Posted in Art, Birds, Journeys, Nature, tagged on January 27, 2016| 2 Comments »

Painting by Pat Bean

Painting by Pat Bean

“The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls.” –Picasso

            “A picture is a poem without words.” – Horace

Hiding in Plain Sight

An American bittern in its natural habitat. -- Wikimedia photo

An American bittern in its natural habitat. — Wikimedia photo

I haven’t seen many American bitterns, but the ones I have seen have all been surprises. By that, I mean that I usually had stared at a weedy patch of grass in shallow water for some time before seeing this wading bird.

And then I only saw it because it moved.

The American bittern is one of my favorite birds, perhaps because it’s striped feathers are in themselves art.

“Nature is often hidden, sometimes overcome, seldom extinguished. – Francis Bacon      

Blog pick of the Day. Check it out.

Blog pick of the Day. Check it out.

Bean Pat: Daily Echo http://tinyurl.com/jt9r6rx Meeting on the Moor. My kind of walk.

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Nothing Seems to Have Changed

Posted in Art, Books, Journeys, Nature, tagged , , , , on January 6, 2016| 4 Comments »

          

The color purple makes my world better, especially when it trims up some white flowers and helps attract a butterfly. Photo by Pat Bean

Flowers make  my world better, especially when they attract a butterfly.           Photo by Pat Bean

 

  “The salvation of America and of the human race depends on the next election … But so it was last year, and so it was the year before, and our fathers believed the same thing 40 years ago.”    

While these words might have been written just yesterday, they were actually written 168 years ago by Ralph Waldo Emerson

The color blue cheers up my world too, especially when used by glass artist Chihuly in this outdoor sculpture piece. -- Photo by Pat Bean

The color blue cheers up my world too, especially when used by glass artist Chihuly in this outdoor sculpture piece. — Photo by Pat Bean

I came across the quote when I was reading my 1998 journal, some of which was written at the same time I was reading Emerson’s journals and, at the same time, ranting about talk show hosts like Jerry Springer and narrow-minded windbags who preach of Christian values but seem to have no Christianity in them.

I was a reporter at the time and so couldn’t turn off what was going on in the world, which some days I now do for the sake of my sanity. Instead, back then, I comforted myself with the thoughts of writers like Emerson, who recognized the world has its cruel side, always has and probably always will, but focused more on its positive attributes.

“My life is a May game. I will live as I like. I defy your strait-laced, weary, social ways and modes. Blue is the sky, green the fields and groves, fresh the springs, glad the rivers, and hospitable the splendor of sun and star. I will play by game out,” he wrote, as well as: “If Milton, if Burns, if Bryant, is in the world, we have more tolerance, and more love for the changing sky, the mist, the rain, the bleak overcast day, the sun is raining light.”

            For me, it’s been writers like Maya Angelou, who believed God put rainbows in the sky to give us hope, and Charles Kuralt, who saw the everyday kindness of the back roads as making up for the acts of greed in the headlines, who have made my world better.

It does no harm just once in a while to acknowledge that the whole country isn’t in flames, that there are people in the country besides politicians, entertainers and criminals,” wrote Kuralt.

If, as my grandmother would say, it looks like the world is going to hell in a hand basket – and I can’t disagree in these troubling times – there is good out there, too. Neighbors helping neighbors when hard times fall, kindness and thoughtfulness as part of everyday, ordinary lives, and friendships and partnerships that last a lifetime.

Yes. Nothing ever seems to change.

Blog pick of the Day. Check it out.

Blog pick of the Day. Check it out.

Bean Pat: CindyKnoke http://tinyurl.com/jsbmjdl I’ve always wanted to live for six months on a houseboat on the Mississippi River. It’s on my bucket list. But this houseboat in Amsterdam looks pretty cool, too. What do you think?

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The Sun and the Mountain

Posted in Art, Journeys, Nature, tagged , , , on September 23, 2015| 3 Comments »

“There is only one day left, always starting over: It is given to us at dawn and taken away from us at dusk.” – Jean-Paul Sartre

Daisies dancing in the sunlight. -- Art by Pat Bean

Daisies dancing in the sunlight. — Art by Pat Bean

Lighting up the Catalinas

I walked my canine companion Pepper, still in my pajamas, at o-dark-hundred this morning. It’s a time when few people are about in my large complex. By the time I was back in my apartment, fixed myself a cup of cream-laced coffee, and settled on my bedroom balcony with my journal and a daily to-do list, it was 6 a.m.

While the sun was up, as it had not been for the past two rainy days, it had not yet reached the Catalina Mountains that so comfortingly stand to my north. I smiled, delighted in the knowledge that I would now be graced with an opportunity to watch the sun creep down from their peaks.

butterfly

A butterfly enjoying the sunlight and the flowers. — Art by Pat Bean

And as I watched, my mind wandered back to the many times I had watched this same sun’s rays creep down the red mountains in Zion National Park. I usually visited this, my most special place in the world, in early April, when mornings were often chilling to the bone. Often I would find myself huddling next to a dawn campfire, watching as the golden rays slowly crept down the cliffs, eager for its warmth to reach our valley camp site. Once I sat so close to the fire that I suddenly realized my tennis shoes were melting.

While these days I find my body mostly rooted close to home, my mind is still free to continue wandering all the places I’ve traveled and relive all my adventures. And since I never know what place my memories will take me next, I still have the luxury of being surprised. And surprises were one of the things I liked best about traveling.

Blog pick of the day. Check it out.

Blog pick of the day. Check it out.

Bean Pat: Lettuce Lake http://tinyurl.com/pz9u75b And there’s also the easiness of armchair travel to let me visit places I’ve never been.

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I’m an Art Schizophrenic

Posted in Art, Journeys, Writing on August 17, 2015| 6 Comments »

This was a carefully done illustration of a gila woodpecker I did to go with an Audubon birding blog.

This was a carefully drawn, then painted, illustration of a gila woodpecker I did to go with an Audubon birding blog.

“Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia.” – E. L. Doctorow

This was a freehand col I did quickly, spending maybe 15 minutes on, and with no advance drawing.

This was a freehand watercolor I did quickly, spending maybe 15 minutes on, and with no advance drawing. I love it.

 

 

Not Sure If That’s Good or Bad

When I was a reporter, I learned to talk to everyone from the homeless guy on Ogden, Utah’s 25th Street to Congressman Jim Hansen in his Washington D.C. office. I loved my life because it was always different and never boring.

And this is a piece I agonized over for days because I had a bright idea of a fish in a bowl of flowers, and which in my opinion is a total flop.

And this is a piece I agonized over for days because I had a bright idea of a fish in a bowl of flowers, and which in my opinion is a total flop. I hate it.

But I eventually developed a voice as a journalist, not so much my own voice but as a style of writing in which I let readers see the world through my eyes. It was more difficult after I retired and began writing personal essays. I had to work to develop my own voice, and that took time. I finally decided that I write with an old broad’s voice, and I say that proudly, who is a wandering wonderer.

Lately I’ve become more active in art, particularly watercolors. This morning I looked at three recent pieces and realized, as far as technique and style, they had absolutely nothing in common. I keep experimenting hoping that I will discover an artistic voice, just as I have a writing voice.

Right now my artistic efforts are clearly schizophrenic. But then again maybe that’s my real art voice. What do you think?

Bean Pat: Paths of Color http://tinyurl.com/pyosgg3 Now this is an artist with a distinctive voice, and its one I love.

 

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What is Success?

Posted in Art, Journeys, Travels With Maggie, tagged , on August 5, 2015| 4 Comments »

Dale Chihuly in the garden. -- Photo by Pat Bean

Dale Chihuly in the garden. — Photo by Pat Bean

“Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life – think of it, dream of it, live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body, be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success.” Swami Vivekananda

Is It Worth It?

I spent this morning editing a chapter in Travels with Maggie, the book I’ve written about my journeys in my RV with my canine companion, Maggie. The chapter includes an account of my visit to the Missouri Botanical Gardens, where Dale Chihuly’s glass art was mingled with tropical plants in the garden’s geodesic greenhouse.

Chihuly flowers

Chihuly flowers — Photo by Pat Bean

I was awed by the exhibit, and lay in bed that night, with Maggie by side above the RV’s cabin, pondering how a genius like Chihuly came to be. But I already knew the answer: Single-minded focus and dedication.

For almost as long as I can remember, I have wanted to be a “great” writer, yet I’m always finding excuses for not writing. I lack the focus of a Chihuly, or a Van Gogh, or even an old boyfriend who religiously practiced his guitar four hours a day, seven days a week. I’m always getting distracted, and it used to be that when the writing went undone, I flagellated myself.

Beside a waterfall. -- Photo by Pat Bean

Beside a waterfall. — Photo by Pat Bean

Such abuse went on for years, until I finally realized that giving up riding roller coasters with my grandkids, arguing politics with my friends, discovering who my grownup children had become, exploring new hiking trails, white-water rafting with my river-rat buddies, mindlessly watching the sun rise and set, piddling with my watercolors, reading Harry Potter the day it came out, and sniffing every flower in life I came across, were more important to me than being a great writer.

Writing is a part of my life, and will always be, but it will never be my whole life. Knowing this, accepting this, and now content with this, I lay silently that night in bed, content and listening to Maggie gently snoring at my feet before I let the waves of sleep take me.

That was several years ago, and time has only made me more content with that decision.

Swami Vivekananda, whom I quoted at the beginning of this blog has it exactly right,  But I’ve chosen another path, the one Albert Schweitzer recommended when he described what it takes to be successful.

“Success,” he said, “is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.”

I did and I do.

Blog pick of the day. Check it out.

Blog pick of the day. Check it out.

Bean Pat: Hunting Butterflies http://tinyurl.com/qxckzg5 Living in the moment. Good advice

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The Desert in Bloom

Posted in Art, Journeys, Nature, Wildflowers, tagged , on May 1, 2015| 3 Comments »

“The sound of colors is so definite that it would be hard to find anyone who would express bright yellow with base notes, or dark lake with the treble.” – Wassily Kandinsky

Vincent van Gogh liked the color yellow, too.

Vincent van Gogh liked the color yellow, too.

The Hue of Sunshine

I’ve watched this past month as cacti and palo verde trees have burst forth with yellow blossoms. I’ve come to think of this buttery splash on the landscape as a likely subject for a Van Gogh painting – well, if he had lived in Tucson.

Palo verdes, the state tree of Arizona, heavily dot the Catalina Foothills where I live. I love the color.

Palo verdes, the state tree of Arizona, heavily dot the Catalina Foothills where I live. I love the color.

Sometimes, as I observe the miracle of the desert coming to life, I find myself singing John Denver’s “Sunshine on my Shoulder Makes Me Happy” – Because it does.

It’s just one more reason I start each day thankful for my life – and extra thankful that I live in a country where a woman is free to enjoy the bounties of Mother Nature anytime she wants. I wish it were true for all men and women alive in the world today. And I grieve because it isn’t, especially for the women who make up the majority of the oppressed in many countries.  Don’t you?*

Blog pick of the day. Check it out.

Blog pick of the day. Check it out.

Bean Pat: Portrait of Wildflowers http://tinyurl.com/ojb29cy I’m not the only one who enjoys the color of sunshine.

*This topic crept its way into my blog, not at all where I intended the end of my writing to go. It is, however, a topic that is much on my mind. I often feel guilty because of my simple luck of not being born in a country where an outspoken woman has to fear for her life. I seriously doubt I would have survived to become the old broad I am today if not for my birth-place luck.   

           

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So What? I’m a Procrastinator

Posted in Art, Birds, Journeys, tagged , on April 16, 2015| 7 Comments »

            “It’s income tax time again, Americans: time to gather up those receipts, get out those tax forms, sharpen up that pencil, and stab yourself in the aorta.” ~Dave Barry=

Hey you Procrastinator? -- Photo by Pat Bean

Hey you Procrastinator? — House finch photo by Pat Bean

And OK with That – and Taxes, Too

I was doing what every red-blooded, procrastinating American was doing at 9 p.m. last night – filing my income taxes.

Doodling with watercolor. -- By Pat Bean

Doodling with watercolor.  Check out today’s Bean Pat  — Doodle By Pat Bean

But I would have had it done by 2 p.m. if Turbo Tax hadn’t locked me out from their site. It seems I tried too many times to remember last year’s password. I was told to try back in 15 minutes. I waited a half hour, but was still locked out. Again, again and again. Finally I gave up and went to the H&R Block site, where I used their free forms and was done in half an hour.

I felt lucky because all I owed Uncle Sam was $101. I was even thankful t I didn’t have enough medical costs to take anything but the standard deduction

While, like most everyone else, I don’t like paying taxes, I’m extremely thankful that I had enough income in 2014 to have all the necessities of life with a little extra for luxuries, like good coffee and gas for a few road trips. It would be worse not to have owed the government.

I just wish Uncle Sam would spend his money as wisely as I try to do.

Blog pick of the day. Check it out.

Blog pick of the day. Check it out.

Bean Pat: Doodling http://tinyurl.com/mtp9zy6  I should have been doing something like this while waiting yesterday for Turbo Tax to unlock my account.  Anyway, this is a fun blog from a favorite blogger of mine.

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