Sunny Sunday

I am in love with the painting I finished last night. When I first began it, it kind of bothered me but as it grew, I began to really dig the images and I am in mad love with how vibrant the colors turned out. 

I am an artist of color and shape. I believe in using and manipulating shapes and colors to allow the image and vision to emerge. It sounds lofty, but I've really come to believe that when you do art, there is a reason and purpose behind it (even simply to tell a good story). Mine's simply shape and color. There is a story here. Can you see it?

The first real painting I did for pleasure was one that's traveled with me since senior year of college. My roommate was taking an art class and shared her canvas and paint with me. Again, shape and color tell the story. This one's got a lot of angles, but I like to think it's a woman in a parka on a park bench. Maybe you see something else. 

In entirely unrelated news, it's volunteer appreciation week at the place I volunteer. The only snag in it is that all of the events happen during the week; I happen to be a Sunday volunteer, so unless I make the effort to go in for my free Panda Express, I miss out. Fortunately, I work for such wonderful people, I got my appreciation today!

The library assistant brought me a big, bright sunflower. Just looking at it makes me so cheerful and happy. 

Perhaps more exciting than the sunflower was the compliment a patron shared today. She had asked me to get in touch with one of the nurses, and I said I wanted to make sure I was calling the right extension. I asked the la, who told me how to do it. I called it and handed the woman the phone. When she hung up she told me that was great customer service. Plus one on the happy points.

So a few minutes later, her son wanted to play a game on the computer. He was having trouble getting it to work, so I went over and walked him through getting it started on another computer through a mirror site. It got up and running and he was able to play. The mom not only thanked me, told me I gave great customer service, and said it was so rare to find, she asked the la if she was a volunteer and when she said no, she told her how great I was in being helpful. The la, after we had earlier discussed my 5 months of unemployment and rejection, asked the woman if she would hire me, and the woman said she'd not only hire me, but for that treatment, she'd want me to be helping run the place. 

It's really the small things that make your entire mood and day turn around. A nice painting, a pretty flower, and a wonderful compliment made today a wonderful Sunday.