Art calendars! (And other fun gifty things.)

Hi friends,

I have designed three art calendars for 2010 - one featuring animal art from my earlier works, one featuring landscapes and one featuring my newest SimpleTerms stuff. ALL of them are 40% off through tomorrow! And prints are 50% off and cards are 55% off. It is all part of Zazzle's Black Friday sale. For all the details including free shipping, visit my Holiday Sale page and scroll to the bottom or click the Zazzle link.

Wishing you well.

Happy Holidays,
Melissa

Suport living artists. Give art for the Holidays.

My Holiday Sale starts ... now! http://tinyurl.com/yjtpnfc Ridiculously low prices on original art. Yay!

Trust

Shhh (The Baby is Sleeping)

Please click the picture or the title to visit my website for close up images and a description of this original painting.

Trust. Innocence. Peace. Is it possible to relearn childhood. To be reborn? Not in a religious sense, but in an emotional sense. To trust as completely as a child who has never been hurt? Or a puppy who knows only love and chew toys? I watch Animal Cops on TV and they take animals out of horribly abusive and neglectful homes, place them in foster homes, and within a matter of months - sometimes weeks! - those animals are loving and trusting and happy. Not all of them. Some are so damaged they react to everything with aggression. But many come through with shining spirits and become devoted companions.

Can we lay down old traumas and open ourselves to new joys like those banged up skinny dogs?

*** Please remember that all of my images are copyrighted and may not be used without permission. Thank you. ***

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

Tiny Art #470

(Please click the picture or the title to visit my website for close up images and a description of this original drawing.)

I gave up television two weeks ago. So hard! Still so hard! It is the mother of all addictions, I think. But I feel better. Each day it gets easier. And I feel better. I think that hypnotic little box has already eaten years of my life. Years! And for what? It scares me how easily I am pulled in by TV. And hours just disappear. And I think, "But I have to see the end of this show!" When I am certain that whether or not I see the end of that show, my life will still be the same. I will not remember that show at all in two weeks time. I won't remember the ending I did or did not see. It won't matter at all. But I feel COMPELLED to find out who the serial killer is and which of his multiple personalities dismembered his mother. Ha!

*** Please remember that all of my images are copyrighted and may not be used without permission. Thank you. ***

Prayer request for my landlords...

Hi friends,

I am posting this very brief note in case you are the type to pray or to send out "good juju". My landlords need help. They are a young couple with a 1 year old baby girl named Hope. Their names are Audrey and Duane Heinen. Duane has brain cancer. They just found another tumor and it is inoperable and radiation is no longer an option. They have tried three kinds of chemo to no avail. Duane needs a miracle. So if you are inclined, please keep the Heinen family in your prayers and share this note with others who might also help.

Thank you!

Wishing you well,
Melissa

PS: I just found these media reports on them, too. Also, if you are willing, please consider tweeting this out or otherwise sharing it with folks who also pray or meditate to help others. Thanks!

http://www.sctimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090927/NEWS01/109270002

http://kstp.com/news/stories/s1171040.shtml

From the archives: Listening

Listening

Please click the picture or the title to visit my website for close up images and a description of this original painting.

*** Please remember that all of my images are copyrighted and may not be used without permission. Thank you. ***

From the archives: Shaman

Shaman

Please click the picture or the title to visit my website for close up images and a description of this original painting.

*** Please remember that all of my images are copyrighted and may not be used without permission. Thank you. ***

My first ever LOLCAT

I used a photo of Waffle when she was a kitten...

New Art - My Friend is a Bear

My Friend is a Bear

Click the picture or the title to visit my website for close up images and a description of this original painting.

*** Please remember that all of my images are copyrighted and may not be used without permission. Thank you. ***

New Art - Balloon Boy painting

Hi friends,

I am going to start introducing artwork via my blog, one piece each day. I will often show new work, but I will pull something out of the archives occasionally, too. Today's new painting is titled: I'm Sorry Your Parents Are Selfish Nutjobs. You can find this one on FlyingGirl.com.

Title: I'm Sorry Your Parents Are Selfish Nutjobs

Completed in: 2009

Size: 7" x 9"

Materials: Acrylic on a rigid canvas panel

Including the words: Poor Balloon Boy It's not your fault, Kid.

This painting is about the Heene balloon hoax, but more than that, too. You know that poor boy will blame himself for whatever consequences befall his rotten parents. He told the truth on TV and responded that he hid while folks were searching for him because his parents told him to do it "for a show". And because he told the truth, his parents will get in trouble. What kind of parents coach their children to lie and put on a show to deceive everyone? Selfish nutjob parents who are more concerned with their needs than the wellbeing of their children. Thank you, Heenes, for making my family seem normal by comparison.

This painting is for all of you out there who grew up with selfish nutjob parents. A not-so-serious reminder that their problems are not your fault.

Here are some close-ups...

And here is a link to the page for this piece on my site....

I'm Sorry Your Parents Are Selfish Nutjobs

*** Please remember that all of my images are copyrighted and may not be used without permission. Thank you. ***

39

On Monday, October 5th, I turned 39 years old. I am in the midst of a distinctly Midwestern midlife crisis. I am not out buying a sports car or shagging a nineteen year old boy. I am not even dyeing the gray hair that appeared out of nowhere a few months ago. I am just quietly going about my boring life in a state of shock. Unaware of how I could possibly have come to be this woman.

I am not entirely unhappy with my life. I am just having a hard time believing this IS my life. And how could I be this old? How could it be 2009? I don't understand it.

My mind is an unwieldy giant slippery fish. Like a Muskie. I can't hold it. I never could. I have Attention Deficit Disorder. I cannot hold my thoughts and I cannot control my impulses. The stuff in my brain that would help me make choices is missing. I used to think ADD was some modern hoax. But a kind and perceptive psychiatrist in a long ago work place noticed my wild monkey mind and suggested I go for testing. I was off the charts. And I got diagnosed at 30 years old. They put me on medication and it was like a miracle. Like I felt the sun for the first time ever. I had time to think before acting on impulses. I had time to make wise choices. I felt in control and alive and so grateful. But the affects of the medication wore off over time so I had to take more and more. Then the side affects were too great, so I stopped taking it altogether.

My life has been a confusing tangle of difficult messes. Somewhere along the way, with the crappy relationships and the crappy habits and all the things I did and bought and ate to fill up the giant gaping void of my past, I forgot about the ADD and the medication experience. I spent years just grabbing at that Muskie with my bare hands. Of course I never caught it. Of course I got all wet. I nearly drowned, in fact! Several times.

So here I am at 39 with my broken brain and too many regrets in a life that feels foreign but not all bad. I have made a whole lot of paintings and drawings along this bizarre theme park ride of a life. And I have learned much about life and mortality and humanity and what matters. I have grown so much closer to God and to Buddha and to The Great Spirit. And I have survived which is something.

I do not form connections with humans easily or well. Maybe I am too sensitive. Or maybe I just don't know how. Or maybe I am just too absorbed by other pursuits. But I want to get better at this. And I want to get better at managing my life. With less drama. And I want to get better at making money and supporting myself.

Somehow, I managed to get away from eight years mired in an ugly relationship. I got away from the overwhelming noise and visual clutter of the city I lived in my whole adult life, too. To a peaceful home. I have never really had this luxury before. Of loving a place. Of feeling at home. Belonging to hills and trees and rocks and a river. I have a river. I think of it as my river. That is something for sure.

My parents helped me escape and I am so grateful. I will always owe them for this new chance at life.

In this new home, in this time of middle-age, something unexpected is happening. I am beginning to care. About my health, my life, a future. And also about my community, my country, the world. I have always wanted to help. I am a helper. But I used to want that almost as a sense of identity. I wanted to help as a way of disappearing. In this new world, I am beginning to feel my feet on solid ground - a new feeling! And I am coming to understand a new kind of helping. Where I might actually take care of myself. And nurture myself. So that I can really help. In a more meaningful and selfless way. Not to disappear. Not to define me. But to help because I am finally appearing in full. Because I am finally reaching for a bigger definition. A full and complex definition of myself that includes not only my best instincts, but also my crappy ones. Not only my hopes, but also my failures. So that I can help others and bring some small bit of comfort or light to the world not by putting me aside, but by being more fully the crackpot bighearted mess that I am.

In other words, I want a future. I have spent the past year or two studying and listening to the past. And now, I want a future.

I want to thrive. Not just survive. I am tired of just surviving. I want to thrive. I want to feel my own power and paint what I need to paint and find my audience and sell a bunch of art. I want to work hard and focus and become more, better. I want abundance! Peace. And to be of service.

After five years of not seeing the Dr., I finally went and got all the tests I'd been avoiding. And then I got surgery that scared the crap out of me. And then I got myself back on medication for my slippery Muskie brain. Because I need that help right now. All of these acts are radical in my world. Taking care of myself is radical in my world.

My hope is to one day implement a variety of tools that help me cope with the ADD (and the Snuffalupagus of Depression always meandering through my life) by meditating regularly and journaling and exercising. Enjoying time with my beloved animals and learning to truly relax. But for now, I need medication in order to have a fair shot at learning those new patterns.

So I set off this week on the last leg of my pre-forty life. I will tell you now. Honestly. I have not enjoyed my thirties so much. Not so much. But I expect my forties to kick ass. I know I have it in me. An ass-kicking kind of life. I feel it in me. My job for this year of being 39 is to lay the groundwork for my kick-ass forties. To learn how to live without my crutch of self-destruction. To learn how to fill the voids inside (and outside) with meaning instead of clutter. With fruit instead of French fries. With dreams and humor instead of mindless entertainment and distracting mayhem.

I think I will be writing more. So if you are bored, stop by and check in on me, okay? I have turned off comments here because I cannot read comments without feeling guilty about not responding. And I already spend too much time dorking around on the computer, so I don't want more time consuming computer chores nagging at me. If you have a response, you can email me, but please do not be mad if it takes me a while to respond. Email is on my shit-list right now. You can also call me if you have the number. I am always happy to yack with you on the phone and it is never a disruption. I can not hear the phone ring when I am in the studio working.

Love to you,

Melissa

My new favorite thing

I "discovered" this poem like a gift. It makes me very happy. I feel at home in this poem. :)


People Like Us
by Robert Bly

There are more like us. All over the world
There are confused people, who can't remember
The name of their dog when they wake up, and people
Who love God but can't remember where

He was when they went to sleep. It's
All right. The world cleanses itself this way.
A wrong number occurs to you in the middle
Of the night, you dial it, it rings just in time

To save the house. And the second-story man
Gets the wrong address, where the insomniac lives,
And he's lonely, and they talk, and the thief
Goes back to college. Even in graduate school,

You can wander into the wrong classroom,
And hear great poems lovingly spoken
By the wrong professor. And you find your soul
And greatness has a defender, and even in death you're safe.


— from the book titled Morning Poems by Robert Bly. © Harper Collins