This has definitely been a strange summer. I am still fighting cancer through chemo treatments, but I am also painting a lot more than I had figured I would at this time in my life. Both the radiation and the chemo treatments tend to make you tired, but I find that except on the three or four days immediately following the latest chemo treatment, I can find enough energy to go outside and paint. In fact, I've had a pretty productive summer. In some ways, the unpredictable weather we've had has caused more trouble than has the continuing medical treatments. The weather has been what could be called variable, or "very variable". There has been a lot of shifting between partially sunny days, and cloudy ones, and it makes chosing which paintings I work on a bit challenging.
Two or three weeks ago, I decided to write up a list of places I would want to paint in the area, and I have over twenty ideas, or locations, maybe even twenty five. When I finish one painting, I start another, if not a day or two later, than immediately. In some cases, I do need to put together a canvas that fits the idea I have in mind. Other times, I can draw from a stack of blank or old, unfinished canvases that I've had sitting around for a while. Regardless, I get going pretty fast.
I have painted three paintings in one of our local parks. The first was a long view of trees in late winter, the snow was almost gone, and you can see neighborhood houses on the horizon. The second was a stream that flowed into the local river, although the parks department saw a need to cut a path and build a bridge right across the stream where I was painting. Luckily this happened a week after I finished. The third painting is now almost done. It shows the large trees along one of the parking lots in t he park, along with cars parked there. Because I am set up near one of the paths, it has drawn more attention than just about anything else I've done this summer.
While working on this last mentioned painting, one of the young ladies working for the park suggested I paint the swimming beachwiththe early mornign sun shining on it, but the weather has made it very difficult to be out at that time. Maybe mornings had seen either cloudy weather, or heavy haze from the western forest fires. As I write, it's raining again at a time when I should be painting there.
I've done two other paintings in two other parks, and I have a painting of a small waterfall planned in autumn. I also did two paintings of downtown locations this summer, both in the morning, and I've painting a few paintings of clusters of houses in town. At some point, I'd like to get out to Lake Michagan and paint the shoreline, possibly from Lion's Den Park. I painted that famous lake a number of times when I lives in Milwaukee. It's on my list but it's just one of a numberof ideas I will get to at some point. In fact, I think that planning ahead by writing up a list of potential plein air painting ideas is a very good idea. It keeps you on track, and hopefully, prevents you from dismissing ideas that could end up being promising. If a man struggling with cancer can be productive, those with less challenging issues should be able to get out and paint come hell or high water.
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