Why Flowers????????

If you had told me

that I would be a flower painter,

in oils, no less

while I was in college I would have laughed at you.

Of course, I loved flowers,

but I was living life in the fast lane:

classes, work, a son to raise.

No time to smell the flowers,

let alone paint them.

But I was once rescued from a fall from a window

by a lilac bush

and I have owed something

to flowers ever since.

I lived in the Southwest for many years.

Water and flowers are a precious commodity out there.

I began to yearn for a garden,

and the smell of lilacs.

I built a fine garden on my patio

full of scented jasmine,

rosemary,

a few snapdragons.

Then I moved to the Midwest.

More rain,

more flowers.

An amazing amount flowers!

Even the trees had flowers.

They beckoned and begged.

I planted roses and poppies,

I planned for hydrangea and lilacs.

And then for  some sad reason,

I could no longer have a garden. 

Something else was planned for my space

and my heart broke.

In the mean time, I re-discovered the light and color of oil painting.

A bit more gutsy than watercolor,

more luminescent than acrylics.

I was in love.

I began to paint flowers.

The flowers I could not have.

I am painting my garden,

stealth gardening on a windowsill.

Joyfully planting all those wonderful colors and shapes

borrowed from the gardens of friends.

Discovering new to me blossoms

in garden shops and florists.

I have an entire library on gardens.

My life dream is to visit the ultimate artist's garden,

Giverny in France.

A dream I am pressing very hard to come true.

to stand in the space of another artist

who was in love with

paint and flowers,

to reach through time and say hello,

I love you.

JOY.

Visit my garden here.