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Sun Rise over White Head, Monhegan Island

On a Sunday morning late in June my husband and I decided to pick strawberries.  The fields in Orrington had just opened for the season and the call of berries was on my mind.  Our plan was to be in Orrington when the field opened at 8:00 am, pick 3 or 4 quarts, and return to Hampden in time to get changed and go to Belfast to Quaker Meeting.  All went well until I saw the berries.  At that point a passion for the present consumed me.  The berries were large and sweet, beautiful in color and shape, they smelled like the emerging breath of summer.  With flats of berry boxes and knee pads on my legs, I crawled thru the rows, savoring being there, picking joy among the leaves.  At one point, I called to my husband that I thought I needed 'adult supervision' as I worked.  The present was that strong.  Thirty quarts later we left the field, made it to Meeting, and spent the afternoon processing berries.

Painting is often like berry picking for me. It starts with intention:  gathering materials, rising early, traveling to a chosen place.  I stop,  look, and wait, expecting to find sweet color, form, shape, light which draws me in.  I hold myself open to the unexpected, the moment in which all breathing stops.  The passion of the present gathers me in.  This summer my painting focused, among other things, on fleeting moments:  sun rise, sun set, wave movements.  I particularly loved the challenge of painting the fleeting glory of sun rise and sun set. 

Swans Island Sun Set - June 20

My journeys took me to three islands to paint:  Swans Island off of Acadia National Park in June, Monhegan Island 12 miles off of Port Clyde in early July, and Campobello Island, New Brunswick, Canada in late July.  Of course water, land, rocks and ocean informed the paintings.  As I settled into each I felt that same pull into the present that berry picking offered:  fully present, totally intense, lost. 

While on Monhegan, I was challenged to capture the energy of waves on the rocks.  Two days were spent developing what I would call 'Wave 1' and 'Wave 2'.  I spent time watching the water, listening to it, drawing the forms, and  finally painting from the drawings informed by colors of the water.  It was particularly challenging to paint as the waves, light, and tide changed, and the sun moved .  My mantra those days was 'The journey of painting 1000 waves starts with one wave'.  Expect to see more water paintings this fall as I continue to explore the movement of water within the rock which bounds it and the energy which moves it.

Wave 2 - Lobster Cove, Monhegan Island

Some days of painting this summer were less intense.  They were still, quiet.  There was the morning after I returned from Monhegan:  my husband and I were sitting outside, enjoying a late breakfast, talking about the week we both had.  My eye drifted to the rock garden near where we sat and the vegetation beyond.  It was  called for a little painting to honor the bounty of early summer.

Flowers for breakfast 

And there was the morning on Monhegan, after completing a very early sun rise painting, that I drifted down to Fish Beach in the town and saw a clumpy old row boat leaning against a stone wall in the sun.  That too inspired a quiet little painting.

Boat and Oars

The summer is not yet over and the passion of strawberry picking still lives.  I continue to be thankful for each day I can paint, for the beauty of the good and generous earth, and for the love of those with whom I share this adventure.  May each of us find times in our lives when we are lost in the passion of the moment, totally in need of 'adult supervision' and absolutely free of it!