heymae

30 Before 30 List Item #5

10
Sep 2009

**For The Love of Art**

I can remember being 5 years old and laying in my bed wide awake in the middle of the night contemplating the meaning of life and getting up numerous times to ” get a drink of water”. Really, I was just checking on my family, making sure everyone was still breathing, you know, normal stuff 5 year olds worry about. I have always been a little anxious, I spend way too much time worrying about EVERYTHING. I think my last two items on my list have made that abundantly clear.

There is, however, one activity I have always been able to do that completely calms my nerves. For once my mind can just rest, I can simply enjoy the calmness around me. For me, this is painting. I love to paint. I do not consider myself very good at it, I will never be a world renowned artist or make a living as a painter. But I love it. It calms my soul. I can paint for hours in silence and for that time, my body will completely relax. I won’t be making to-do lists in my head, or wondering about the future, I will simply be in the present.

I took a painting class last semester that I absolutely loved. Some evenings or on the weekend I would head down to the studio at the school and find an empty classroom, set up my supplies and just paint. There is something so calming about an empty canvas and a bucket full of paint.I love the freedom of it all. I love that mistakes are easily corrected, or not corrected at all. I love that art is all relative. You don’t have to like anything I paint. It really doesn’t matter to me. Sometimes, when I am done with a painting, the end product is irrelevant. It is the process I went through to create the piece that is more memorable to me.

One of my goals is to paint more. To allow myself that time to do something I completely love that is simply for myself. I would like to really push myself as an artist, to really see what I have to say. I have painted pieces before that have shown so clearly what I was feeling, even though I could not put it into words myself. I want to be able to express myself. I really believe that all of us have such a unique story to tell, that is why I write this blog. I am hoping my paintings can someday be an extension of my story, another chapter that my children’s children can see and understand who I was and what I stood for. Hopefully, it will inspire them to find something that they love, that they can do just for themselves. Something that will calm their nerves and set their soul at ease and allow them to escape just for a little while so they can come back refreshed and ready to tackle the world head on. That is what painting does for me.