Thinking of Painting and Don't Ask About Dinner

Back to Monday, my favorite day of the week.  I apologize to those of you who hate Mondays, but I need Mondays like you need that first taste of coffee in the morning.  It's like that.  Okay, I won't bore you with the "gory" details of Monday morning, I know I've been there before and dragged you along.  Yeah, I know, you know, we all know!  Like Jerry Seinfeld used to say, "Yadda yadda."  But I like to say BlahBlahBlah.

So, anyway, a nice quiet weekend at home was spent.  My family came for dinner, we ate, we laughed, we talked.  Was just lovely.  Calm and quiet morning, the Mr. took a ride on his bicycle, Son #2 in LaLaLand sleeping the morning away, and I had coffee and the Morning Pages on my lounge chair in the garden.

The Mr. raises birds.  Canaries, finches, other kinds I can't remember, and hangs them outside our patio room and in the tree where they chirp and sing.  For a while it's nice to hear the birds in the morning.  It feels like a far away forest escape until a few hours go by and the chirping/tweeting doesn't stop from the five or six birds hanging out there and my head feels like it's going to explode if those darn birds don't shut up already! Ugh.

Ahem.  Sorry I almost lost it there.  Anyway.. After a long while they do calm down and so do I.  You know, chirping birds can get just as annoying as kids who don't just play and talk but scream and run around in circles.  Cute and nice at first, bloody murder afterward.

No, I didn't paint this weekend.  That's why I like Monday.  Monday I get back to work too, except I'm already at the job site and everyone else leaves.  On the weekend too many people are around.  I don't mind people looking over my shoulder as I work.  On the contrary, it's nice and social.  But the family has demands.  They need things only I can do.  Yes, only me.  And if I'm painting, it seems to them I'm not really doing anything.  So they talk to me, ask me questions about other things, like what's for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and where's their socks.  Yes, a lovely conversation.  Uh, nope.

Back in the garden.  When my son and now daughter-in-law were planning their wedding, she wanted white hydrangea for her bridal bouquet.  I started looking at this flower differently after that.  I never really liked the bloom heads, all droopy and huge.  After the wedding I found these white hydrangea on sale, barely alive, and practically dried up at the local Home Depot.  I was compelled to rescue it.  Now two years later they are growing and blooming beautifully.  It's called Blushing Bride and bloom all summer long.  Lucky me!

When I look at these flowers I think of my gorgeous daughter-in-law and it makes me so happy.  All weekend I spied this hydrangea thinking of how to paint it.  That's how I spent my time in the garden with no one around.  Observing, thinking, planning, daydreaming, making mental notes.  It's a lot of work, but looks like I'm idle and inactive.  With iced coffee in hand, lounging in the chair in the midst of the blooms I'm painting, but no one is the wiser.