Gray and morose

"Lake and flowers study" by Hilary J England, oil on canvas, 8" x 10"

The gray weather keeps us company again today.  I woke up, and looked out the kitchen door, to see the dense fog lying low along the mountain, seemingly hanging in the treetops, obscuring the view.  The rain has been continuous, with only 2 sunny days out of the last 19.  The creeks are all swollen and raging, and the flowers are busting out everywhere...now, if it will only pause the precipitation for a solid day, I can get out with my gear. 

Yes, I am a wuss when it comes to painting in discomfort.  I've done my days of wet feet, frozen, numb fingers, and the wind blowing my easel and painting face down into the dirt, and quite frankly, my days of this torment are over (at least that's how I feel now--I could always get that masochistic idea rise up again).  I wait for the decent weather, and paint in relative comfort and ease, or I stay indoors in my studio till it gets too hot, then go out during the day and paint, and return to paint in studio at night when it is cool.  Degas had it right...

I have had a few hiccups this week, and how strange it seems that the relatively annoying stuff is the stuff that bothers us the most.  My car broke down in the middle of nowhere, the drain pipe burst downstairs and the plumber needed to come...not only do these unexpected annoyances bother me the most, they bother my pocket book the most...plumbers and mechanics and towtrucks are not cheap, for sure!!  My mother always said I was in the wrong business...perhaps I should have been a plumber!

Thankfully, these things are fixed, my wallet is drained, but all is quiet for now.  The kids have headed off into their own directions for school, and I should've had school myself today, but there is a hiccup there as well in my program, so I will have to wait a week to resume class.  That frustrates me a little (years ago that would have driven me wild) but I have learned to understand the old Serenity prayer, and this is not a circumstance I can change, only accept with patience and understand it's not anyone's fault, it's just the nature of the beast...

So, with that being said, I head out to my studio, and make lemonade from lemons--I have more time to paint!!  I hope you like the little study I did early last summer when I was hiking about by the Poconos and Beltzville Lake. The sunlight was brilliant, as were the pretty flowers, and I can see the sun if I look into my mind's eye, and that's good enough for right now!