Last year, I had a surgical lumpectomy. It was a pretty large, cancerous lump in my chest, and for the first month, I was too weak and tired to paint. By the end of that month, though, I started a painting of our dining room and newly remodeled kitchen that ended up being too complicated and cluttered to be a successful painting. Over the winter, I painted a small view of the evening sun on the snow pile that the local snow removal people dumped in our cul de sac. I also painted the corner of our basement where my wife did laundry. By the end of winter, I was healing well, and looking to paint outside again, although it was cold and I was still kind of weak.
During this time, I should have had radiation and chemo therapy, but my doctors thought the surgery had been a complete success, and chose not to do it. I started a painting in one of our local parks in February. The snow was melting, and I really liked the winter colors with the neighborhood houses in the distance. I started a second painting on the other side of the busy street that borders the park, one that included several houses on a corner. I really liked that view too. It was during the last sessions of painting those houses that the doctors found that the cancer had returned in full force and that this was not a happy situation.
I had started a third painting, an early spring view of a parking lot and major street from a downtown side street. I was painting it early in the morning.. I liked the way the sun shown through the early spring foliage of the trees at that scene. But, at that time, the doctors had grim news, I really didn't know if I'd be here now, writing this November blogpost. May was avery hard and sad time, and painting that picture was hard as hell. But I completed it, and I was still here when I finished it in early June.
The irony was that during all of this, a city worker took a picture of me painting and posted it on our city's website. It drew very litle attention, but it seemed like a motivational boost at a very bad time.
One thing I did was as an act of defiance again fate. Besides saying a prayer, I set out to make a list of the various places I wanted to paint, and came up with a list of over twenty places. If I was going to die, I wanted to paint these pictures first. Well, I have to say, that at least a few of them were not great painting ideas, and some of them, such as finding a place to paint along our southside shopping district, still has not come to fruition. Anyway, by late May, I made plans to paint until I died, come hell or high water.
I had four paintings from the previous year that, due to the operation or other issues, such as the drought we had last year, I had held off finishing, and so I started working on them. A large painting of a countryside view of a horse farm only required a sign to balance the small splash of red on a barn on the right side of the painting. Another painting needed red added to a traffic light. So, now, two paintingswere done. But two others required major work. A view of a stream in our local park that was only half done due to the previously mentioned drought, and a view of a subdivision from the high point of the town. That last painting was was barely started when I had my operation, so I set out to paint it.
It as at this time that I started radiation and chemo. Radiation is dangerous, but it is focused on the new tumor, and it didn't give me too much trouble as I painted. Chemo was much harder, and it came about three weeks after I finished radiation. I had heard stories from people who really struggled with chemo, but as I said, this was a hell or high water situation with my painting. I would do what I had to do.
The last painting I mentioned, the one of the subdivision, was being painted at 7 o'clock in the evening in June and July. I also got up at 7 in the morning to paint a second painting of several buildings on the southside of our downtown. At midday, I painting in two different parks, one of a stream with a playground in the distance, and another of trees at another park's entrance. Painting was not really hard, but I was still very depressed, aswell as exhausted from the chemo, and paintingreally lifted my spirits. Sometimes my sessions were only about a half hour long, with the exhaustion and nausea hitting me. I soon had my next paintings picked out when I was finished with the first batch..
That was in early July. That second batch of paintings included a parking lot in one of the previously painted parks, a parking lot that had very large trees lining it. I liked that view. When I paint, I tend to spot secondary locations nearby that I could later paint. In the past I grew tired of any one location while I was painting it, and rarely did the second idea. Not now. I was going to paint come hell or high water. I also painted a row of houses near our middle school. There, I spotted another second location to paint. I also have a third lined up for next year.
That took me to August. By that time, the doctors were sure that the tumor had shrunk somewhat. On at least two occasions, I had heavy doses of chemo, but I continued to fight offthe nausea, and kept painting. Much of that summer we had rain, and I picked out an cloudy day idea to paint, one of three houses painted on an angle from our Moose Lodge. A young park worker also recommended painting their beach at sunrise, which I did. I also struggled with a painting of the parking lot of the post office, which was not as successful as I had hoped, but I met several people there and talked with them, and the expeirence was rather enjoyable.
My wife was rather bored by my streak paintings that involved houses and parking lots, so we drove out into the country and I spent September afternoons, painting two farms in the distance. By October, I had two more paintings going downtown, but autumn color came slowly and went by fast. I'll have to finish one next autumn, with the other painting ready to be completed with cooperative weather.
My last chemo treatment was in October. We are now planning for a new procedure in November. I've bought a sheet of masonite and had it cut to smaller size. I rarely work smaller, but masonite gives me a less ragged surface than does canvas. I'll try to do some indoor paintings, and possible some outdoor paintings of Christmas lights. This summer, I finished about fifteen paintings while dealing with radiation and chemo. While this summer was rathe traumatic, it was also the most productive time I ever spent painting.
I want to post photographs of the paintings I mentioned above, but until I get a handle on medical expenses, a good photo app will have to wait.
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