Sometimes life has a way of showing you a new way to look at an old thing. This painting was one of those shifting perspectives. To start with, the painting was originally an abstract done by another artist. A double paneled canvas with a large, triangular shape in the middle. Abstracts aren’t much my thing, but snatching up a couple of canvases to repaint on the cheap most definitely is! I immediately re-imagined other purposes for those two canvas, and bought them for a bargain at a local yard sale.

A year went by. I hadn’t been moved to paint the two canvas yet. That point of my life was very busy. I was in the midst of college and absorbing a lot of new information on a regular basis. My children were young, growing, and involved in many activities, in school and out. And in my personal realm, I was diving headfirst into all the information I could find about the environmental issues of our country. The Keystone XL project and tar sands. Fracking and wastewater. The Pacific Garbage Patch and the persistence of plastic in our environment. Climate change. A million realities swirled around me…some I could control, and some I could not. In the middle of all the realities, I felt like I was drowning.

And from that space, this painting was born.

One day I sat down staring at my sort-of blank canvas, wondering at the future in front of me and my children. There was a lot of uncertainty in my life, and theirs. I didn’t know how to prepare them because I didn’t know how to prepare myself. And as I contemplated the realities I was drowning in, I saw a vision in front of me. Two realities. One that chose the path of creation and cooperation. The other that chose the path of self and destruction.

The left panel represents the creative and cooperative forces. There is a harmony throughout the picture. A natural ebb and flow with which the people of this land reside. They know their land and it’s seasons. They utilize their knowledge to live in abundance with it, and each other.

The right panel represents the destructive and self-consumed forces. There is a disconnect of the people from the land they are a part of. They wait in lines to do work that lacks meaning, or destroys the things that means the most. They absorb themselves in distractions, and lack care or capability to change the destruction that is taking place all around them.

A child stands in the left panel painting, looking out at the future ahead of her on the right panel painting. She sees the storm coming, but is helpless to it’s forces.

The feeling of drowning among the forces I feel helpless to is something I have struggled with for a good part of my adult life. By finding a way to express that feeling in a healthy way, it got it outside of my head and off of my heart. At least enough to lighten my load to be able to “just keep swimming” another day, and not dragged down to drown.

This is one of my dearest paintings. It represents the parts of my life that I am learning to carry in those better ways. I am grateful for each brush stroke, and how it helps bring me closer to that capability.