Paintings in progress

Some artists work exclusively on one piece at a time. I'd love to have that kind of concentration and dedication, but I just can't do it. I've got to have options on what to work on, I get frustrated with things, put them aside for a while, then come back when I have some fresh eyes. At any one time, I probably have about ten pieces in the works. Here's a small group of them:

This was actually a HUGE reworking of a painting that I was never crazy about. I don't think it'll ever go up for sale simply because it's an overpaint that I never did correctly. I still play around with it every now and then - it's been "in progress" for six months.
So far, this hasn't had a bit of paint associated with it, but this was an initial sketch from a picture I took of my "little" brother Blake. I'm a little iffy on the composition of it, the paper I drew this on is a lot more square than the canvas I want to put it on - it's hard to translate it onto a different space.
This isn't showing up as well as I'd like, the color is quite a bit off. I found the reference picture associated with this while looking through an old high school friend's myspace page, and I took a bit of creative license to it. Some days I'm ready to trash the whole thing and start over.

This had a lot of promise when I started... I found the reference picture - a friend had taken it of a poppy field in France - the same day my friend Claire told me the story of how she started her obsession with poppies. She was having a really rough time a few years back and was driving a lot between Knoxville, Tennessee, and Lynchburg, and one day, she was having such a hard time, she just pulled over to burst into tears about everything. When she finally looked up, she noticed that she hadn't even looked over on the side of the road, and right there was a huge, beautiful field of poppies. It hadn't been there the day before, and may not have even been there the next day, but she kind of adopted it as HER flower. I loved the story, and I think I might have kept it in my mind as I worked on this for a while. Unfortunately, however, the lighting has driven me a little crazy. I can't seem to give it depth. I'm going to pick it up and finish it pretty soon here.

I'm hoping to finish all of these BEFORE I move back home. I'll update as some of them get completed.

Smoking is a tough boyfriend to dump...

Spurred on by my list of goals to achieve in the next 1000 days, I'm tackling what might be one of the toughest tasks - quitting smoking.

I wasn't always a smoker. In the first 21 years of my life, I smoked maybe a pack and a half. I never actually bought a pack for myself until I moved to Boston - this is a little ironic, considering I grew up in tobacco country and went to school in the South, where smoking is still very much accepted. Boston even went smoke-free a few weeks before I moved there. But while doing graduate school full-time, going through the break-up of the longest relationship I've ever had and other significant stresses, I picked it up. I thought I'd never become "addicted", and to be honest, part of me still believes that I'm not. I've run the gamut for levels of indulgence in the cancer sticks - I've been a "smoker when I drink", a "closet smoker", a pack-a-day moron, a "smoker to kill the appetite" (this only works for a day or two, trust me - it no longer has an effect on my appetite), and even a "just one in the morning" smoker.

I know, it's not becoming. Trust me, I know. It ruins your skin, it causes cancer, it makes your lungs perform at record low levels, and it's just plain unattractive. I don't have to be sold on this aspect of it - I am perfectly aware of the risks to my health, my vanity and everything in between.

But I'll admit: I, as well as many other smokers, just plain LIKE to smoke. If you've never been a consistent smoker, well, good for you, but I haven't quit yet simply because I just like it. When my life sucks, and I'm about to bust out crying at anything, I can go out on the porch and escape everything for five minutes. After reading The Power of Now and realizing the importance of meditation, I've come to the conclusion that to many of us, smoking is an act of meditation. There's an unwritten "no assholes" rule on just about every smoker's porch in the world, and you can either socialize or choose to be by yourself out there. It calms you, helps you slow your breathing and blood pressure, and stabilizes emotions that have gone through the roof. A pack of Parliament Lights doesn't tell me that I'm doing things wrong, a lighter doesn't make me cry, and I don't think I've ever gotten in an honest-to-god argument with someone while smoking. Well, excluding my ex, that is.

That being said, again, I know I need to quit. I don't want to fail, so I'm trying to get a multi-pronged approach to removing that Philip Morris out of my life.

1. The patch. I think I can quit without it. But I don't want to find myself failing at the get-go because I haven't realized the full power of nicotine addiction. Cold turkey may work, but I don't want to make this too hard on myself.

2. Incentive. I'm thinking of setting up an ING account to take a dollar a day out of my checking so I can reward myself for not smoking. If I stumble, the money for that day goes to the American Cancer Society. Given the fact that I have very little money, however, I've got to figure out something else. Any ideas?

3. A built-in response to weakness. My quit date hasn't been established yet (I think I need a specific time built in stone where I just get rid of every pack laying around the house), but I'm kind of taking the weight watchers approach - I just need to recover from stumbles rather than give up on the whole goal. After my quit date, I'm giving myself ten moments of weakness. Ten. That may sound like a lot, but I'm guessing you've never been a smoker if it does. If I'm considering using one of them, I'll think long and hard as to whether or not I really want to use one of my ten.

4. Alternatives. I have to figure out something else to do when I usually smoke - when I'm walking the dog, when I'm driving, when I'm done with a meal, when I'm drinking, when I'm bored, when work is getting to me, etc. This is a lot harder than you think.

5. Figure out how to avoid the quitting-smoking weight gain. I personally don't care if I gain a few, but the reality is that I can't afford to not fit into my clothes. This is also pretty difficult - I'm allergic to chewing gum. I'm thinking about toothpicks, although I know I'll look like an even bigger redneck.

Any ideas? Anyone got an incentive they're willing to stake me to? I'll do the same for one of your goals.

Creative Spark: Your Life Story...

Write your life story in one grammatically correct sentence.

Creative Spark: Songs you know by heart

Pick a song you know all the words to.
What color is it?

Creative Spark: Color

Get a box of crayons and a coloring book page.
Fill every space in with the "wrong" color.

Creative Spark: Let me count the ways...part 2.

Take out the list you made yesterday and look at the final tally. Make a blank list with the same number of items.

Fill in the list with positive attributes of the person you like the LEAST.

Resist the urge to quit.

Creative Spark: Let me count the ways...

Take a legal pad and list the attributes person you like most in the world. Aim for getting the number of items as high as possible. Put it in a safe place for tomorrow.

Art Feature - creative spark of the day.

I haven't had a lot of art postings lately, but I'm getting back to it.
My first step toward this is a daily "spark" to make you think creatively. Be it art, writing, music, whatever, hopefully it will get your mind going when you're staring at that blank canvas, paper or musical instrument. Even if you aren't an artist, it will help you think calmly and clearly throughout the day. I promise

Today's creative spark:

Pick a random picture from a magazine, flickr, or any other source. Don't look at any accompanying caption. Write down everything you see for five minutes. Write down everything about what you don't see for ten minutes. If there's people in the picture, who's taking the picture? What are the people thinking? What do they really want? How did they end up in this picture instead of another? If it doesn't have people in it, why not?

Pick your own, or I'll give you one to start.

How I spent $123 on stuff I didn't really need

Truth:

I am a grade-A NERD. I love - repeat love - the bookstore. I could spend hours and thousands of dollars in one. I prefer Barnes & Noble to Borders, Amazon to any other online bookseller, and I love going through secondhand and specialty bookstores. If, one day, I happened to be struck with the world's worst streak of permanent creative block, I would be a librarian or a bookseller. I learned to read at 3 1/2 and proceeded to read everything I could get my hands for the next 28 years. People comment about how large of a library I have when they visit my home, I am more likely to know where my library card is than my drivers license at any given moment, and I can not remember one trip to a bookstore where I haven't found at least one thing that I just couldn't live without.

Ergo, Molly goes to Barnes & Noble and spends $123 today, forgoing the possibility of picking up her long-overdue dry-cleaning for at least another month.

What'd I get?

The Encyclopedia of Immaturity
Who couldn't use a book detailing the rules of Jinx, how to make a cool costume, and generally how to be the Fun Aunt or Fun Uncle?
My friends often comment that I have good conversation starter books like this as well as The Complete Idiot's Guide to Amazing Sex.
For the record, TCIGTAS is THE first book everyone picks up in my house. Everyone. Moms, prudes, virgins, gays and straights. People may swear that they identify with Carrie, Charlotte or Miranda, but there's a Samantha in all of us.





Caffeine for the Creative Mind: 250 Exercises to Wake Up Your Mind
The jury is still out with me on whether or not these books work, but as a complete ADHD Certified Hot Mess, I like them because they're typically less than one page directives that help stimulate creativity. I was torn between this and one other, but one idea stuck with me from the other that I might use in a fiction class I'm in -
"Seven days ago, ________ . Now, nobody will ever speak to me again."
I love little creativity stimulants like that - they give me just enough to get going, but not so much direction that it doesn't feel like my work, be it writing or art.



Sams Teach Yourself Adobe Creative Suite 3 All-In-One
I am currently enrolled in Molly University's Crash Course in Building My Own Website and Integrating Creative Software Into My Career. It's a tough class, and it's obviously Pass/Fail. I haven't used Adobe's software since some work I did in 2003. Times have changed. I'm befuddled.
Hence the $40 textbook.







Creating the Breakthrough Portfolio
I'm not entirely sold on this one, so it's going on ebay if I can't make it work for me. It's mainly geared toward Graphic Designers, but a lot of the elements really work for artists, photographers and other freelancers who depend on a portfolio to represent them in their work. It came with a DVD that I'm hoping has a bit of in-depth work on how to make your portfolio, website and other marketing efforts tie together - kind of a "creating yourself as a brand" type of thing.






Moleskine Ruled Reporter's Notebook
One of the best pieces of advice I've ever received for how to beat the creative block is to always keep a notebook handy. They're in my purse, by my bed, by the bathtub, in front of every television, in both my parents' houses...you get the drift. You may ask "...but Molly, why would anyone pay $10 for a notepad?"
You have much to learn, grasshopper. Moleskine notebooks contain, for lack of a better word, magic. I'm not kidding. Hemingway, Picasso, Woodward & Bernstein, and Van Gogh ALL used Moleskine notebooks and sketch pads. I think they put the magic in the expandable pocket on the inside back cover.


Sigh.

I'm poor as hell now, but I love the bookstore.

Quote of the Day #4

"Anybody involved in whatever business they're involved in - they're there for a reason. You can't tell me that proctologists don't have a genuine interest in assholes. Because they do."

-Jay McCarroll, Eleven Minutes - playing Monday at the Independent Film Festival of Boston