the buddy system

You know how when you scuba dive, you always dive with a buddy?

I'm beginning to think I need a buddy for every-day life! I'm in Keizer, Oregon doing a 4-day workshop. Last night, I got off the elevator and walked down my hotel hallway, stopping in front of my door to insert the key card. My card wouldn't unlock the door. That's because I wasn't at the right door, even though this was the third night I was in the same hotel room! Not only was I standing in front of the wrong door, it turned out my room was across the hall! Sheeeeesh....

So then last night, I had dinner with 2 of the women attending my workshop. We went to a Thai restaurant nearby, and I drove. We had a nice, long, relaxing dinner over delicious plates of curries and stir-frys. When it was time to go, I dug into my purse to get my keys ready. No keys. No keys in my coat pocket either, or under the table or anywhere in sight. So out we went to the car....and you guessed it. Keys are in the ignition, the doors are locked tight and the car is running! The car was running the entire 2 hours we were inside enjoying dinner.

Good grief.

I shudder to think of the quality of my life in another dozen years or so....

:-)

remind me again why I do art?

I've been working on my self-portrait the last couple of days.

Working on is the right term. It is such hard work, creating art, isn't it? Like pulling teeth at times. I miss cigarettes when I draw. I haven't smoked in over 2 years, and I won't again...but they sure did seem to help.

You draw a little and think it's all going well...and then you sit back and take a longer view of your work and see that something's wrong...(here's where you light up your menthol extra light 100) and you don't know what's wrong and so you look back and forth and back and forth between your art and photo and then you can't stand it that you can't see what's wrong so you get up for another cup of coffee/diet coke and then you come back and you think maybe you know what's wrong. So you draw a little and think it's going well...and then you sit back...and it all starts all over again.

What is fun about this? What about this process makes us so eager to do it as often as possible? We're all a crazy bunch of loony folks, I say!!!!

On the other hand, sometimes when I look at a few of my finished portraits, I can't quite believe my hands and eyes created such a wonder from colored pencils.

I guess in the end the agony is occasionally worth it. Maybe.

Back to work....

he was home...

On a happier note than that last post...

Yesterday I went to see Kevin. We went to our usual haunt. On the way, we got stuck in a traffic jam and I had my camera, so I took a whole series of pictures of him in the back seat. He was in a great mood, and seemed to like it that I was taking his picture.

We met my daughter and beau at McDonald's and Kevin had a great time watching all the kids bounce around the play area and a great time looking at all the pictures on the camera that I'd just taken of him. He especially loved the ones that his stuffed Barney had made it into.

After a couple hours, we headed back to his group home. We pulled into the parking lot of his apartment complex and I parked the car and turned off the Disney Children's Songs CD we were listening to.

Kevin took off his seat belt without being asked, and he opened his door without prompting. He got out of the car and stood waiting for me to get out and close my door. We started to walk together back to his apartment....and that's when I knew something had changed.

Kevin was home.

I don't know how I knew...but I did. Kevin was home! Kevin was home and he wasn't unhappy that he was home! Kevin has his own home!

I walked him in, and we ended the visit as we always do...His bedroom is on the bottom floor, so after I kiss him goodbye in his room and leave the apartment, I always walk around the outside and knock on his window and tell him again that I love him. He sometimes smiles, but usually he just hangs out in his room until he sees me at the window, and then he walks back to the living room, and I walk away to my car feeling a little sad and guilty. Nothing different last night. Except that everything was different. Kevin was really home and he knew he was home and I knew he was home, and we were both completely okay with that.

I walked back to my car smiling.

Thought you'd all like to know that....

protect me from security

So two days after our dreamy Workshop Cruise, I was back on the road headed to a workshop in Decatur, Illinois. On the way there, I learned an ugly little lesson...

It began with a tardy taxi to the airport, leaving me a bit frazzled...a feeling that intensified as I began the airport security frenzied routine. Off goes the coat. Off go the shoes. Out goes the laptop. Into bins go all, plus my purse, plus my laptop case. Compliantly, I wait for my turn to go forward.

"Take your jacket off," I hear from the TSA agent as I get ready to step through the magic arch. I am wearing a rather heavy fleece button down shirt because I often get cold when flying. Beneath my shirt is a little camisole so tight and unflattering I wouldn't bare it in front of my own mirror, let alone the public at large. Foolishly, (but very politely) I decide to enlighten the agent that my "jacket" is a shirt.

"My jacket is in that bin. This is my shirt."

"Take your jacket off."

"But I hardly have anything on underneath," I say, rather feebly, sensing I'm about to lose this one.

"Take your jacket off or get checked."

Sigh. "Okay....I guess I'll get checked then..."

Isn't that something? How is it I'm so vain? My father warned my sister and me about vanity. In the throes of our pre-teen angst we naturally spent years in front of the mirror trying to make utterly recalcitrant hair behave. Meanwhile my father was absolutely convinced we were dangerously close to strangling in our own vile vanity and never missed a chance to warn us of said danger.

How silly, really, to care if a few dozen people see my well-filled camisole...

I walk through the metal detector to stand by his side, waiting for the female agents who will take me to a little "room", where we will together discover that I am no security risk. Just then, my purse went through the machine. Suddenly and without a hint of warning, another agent is yelling at me. Yelling. Yelling with a red face. Yelling with something way too akin to rage. Yelling with frustration and disgust and fury.

"IS THIS YOURS?!!"

He is 4 feet from me and is holding up above his head my fewer-than-3-ounces perfume bottle, safely encased in its own ziplock bag.

I reply in a confused daze, "Yes."

And then he erupted all over me - something about how I'd left it in my purse instead of taking it out of my purse and now I'd have to relinquish my perfume or check it. But he sort of went on and on and on about it all, yelling the whole time.

I'm telling you, I was stunned. I'm not even sure I understood half what he was saying. I remember just trying to figure out what he was actually telling me. I mean, what was going to happen to me, now that I'd sinned?

In trying to make sense of all this, I mumbled something like, "It's in a ziplock bag..." And that was the wrong thing to say. He exploded with renewed fury, starting the whole diatribe all over again.

Slowly, I came to realize that he really meant it. Perfume in ziplog bag outside purse? Cool. Perfume in ziplog bag inside purse? Very, very, very uncool. As the shock wore off and I began to realize I was about to lose my favorite, expensive, fraught-with-memories-and-sentiment perfume, I very quietly and steadily said, "I will not relinquish it."

His eyes bugged and he started to go from Crimson Red to Henna. "You're not going to relinquish it???!!!! You're going to check it???!!! You're not...you're going to...you're not..."

I swear he started to sputter. I just stood there, quietly.

He half threw it to the women who'd meantime arrived to take me to that private room where next I would succumb to a partial disrobing. Still mostly in a daze of shock, I followed them for the procedure, trying to figure out how I was going to save what was mine. In the end, exhausted but determined, I fell back on tears and sympathy and a good lie.

"I need to keep my perfume. My husband gave it to me and he was killed in a car accident a year ago, and I can't give it up."

They let me keep it.

I'd stood my ground. But what sad ground. How helpless I felt, knowing they had me. I needed to fly and needing to fly meant needing to succumb. I've since learned that I could have asked to see his supervisor. In the future, I will. But this isn't isolated. When we came back from Belize, my daughter put her new cell phone in her checked bag. When she got home, she had a TSA note inside her suitcase, letting her know it had been opened by them. Cell phone was no where to be found. Another friend traveled within the US in January, only to arrive missing a wrapped gift from her suitcase...a gift intended for her sister suffering from breast cancer.

What does it mean when we need security to protect us from security?

a nibble, a peek - Mexican Workshop Cruise

We're back! Of course, I leave again tomorrow morning for a workshop in Decatur, IL....but I've got half a minute to throw up a few photos! Our first ever Mexican Riviera Workshop Cruise was great! Everything went fine, with hardly a hitch. I found out I can do Cecile Baird's burnishing technique, which I thought was thrilling. I found out I can't do Linda Lucas Hardy's technique on sandpaper, which was no surprise! But it was fun trying. This silly shot is from our stateroom balcony. There was a strong reflection on the sliding glass door to our cabin. My sister was getting ready for dinner, so I took the picture myself. See all my silly costume jewelry? It was formal night!


I was too busy making sure everything was going smoothly to remember to take a group shot of everyone. Can't believe I did that! But here's a shot of a lot of us listening to Linda Hardy.





Class was held in one of the dining rooms, so everyone had plenty of room to spread out all their colored pencil stuff. The lighting was hit & miss, but the ship's ride was smooth, and the view out the windows fantastic. Cecile's workshop was first, and it was also the first workshop I've ever taken. I know how everyone feels now, when they take my workshops. You can't imagine how thrilled I was to hear Cecile say my project was "gorgeous"!!!! Was proud as could be.


Here's a shot from our balcony - we were pulling away from Cabo San Lucas. (click to enlarge any of these pix) Marylou (my sister) and I spent the Cabo port day on board...relaxing on a nearly empty ship. She sunned on the deck while I floated in the Lotus Spa pool, going into a trance watching in the breeze the furling and unfurling of the ship's flags directly overhead. It was a few hours of quiet in the middle of a week full of laughing, learning, talking, over-feeding and roaming the beautiful ship.



This is Stephen. He was our fantastic bartender at the Martini Lounge, where I celebrated my birthday on board. He was Scottish and had absolutely the most delightful accent.

These drinks were called "Flirtini's" ...but they came out as "Flot tini's" when Stephen said it! Marylou and I got to bring the pretty glasses home. I would just as soon have brought Stephen home!



We saw the cliff diver's in Mazatlan. Weather was soooooo perfect. Upper 70's and no humidity. These divers made me ill...just the thought of them being off by 6 inches or so. Really...they just barely clear the rocks!


Had to take at least a few artsy shots. These flowers were always on the dining room tables and I loved their cast shadows. I'm not sure what kind of flower it is. Do any of you know?



The only thing I didn't like about our first workshop cruise was that it had to end. Here's a shot of Marylou and I at the airport hotel in LAX on our last night before coming home...

I can not WAIT until our May Alaskan Cruise!! We had a couple cancellations, so there are still a couple spots open. If you want to join us, you have to hurry as the ship itself is nearly full. There's info here:
www.annkullberg.com/cruise.php