A moment like this.....

Ice chunks fell off weary tree limbs, breaking onto the ground with a smack as fat, wet snowflakes descended from the white sky.

That was the scene while walking home from my aunt and uncle's house this afternoon. A sudden snow flurry raced through our neighborhood for about an hour. I decided to stop a moment and sit at the nearby park to take it all in.

On a slush-covered, tilted bench I sat, more ice bits crashing around me. One large chunk in particular slammed onto a lower tree branch loaded with snow, forcing it all down below where I was seated!

And in that moment as the snow "exploded" overhead, cascading down and showering me, I smiled. It was a beautiful moment.

For you see I'm alone, sad, and friendless right now and it's those small, unexpected occurrences that keep me going a little more. It's all I have left so I cling to them tightly. Perhaps that's why I'm immortalizing it here on my blog.

Something good to remember and look back on. A moment like this.....

Wordless Wednesday - City tree butchered!!

I've got mail.....all the way from Germany!

Another lull.

The sketch for the previous post was completed almost two weeks ago now. Nothing has been drawn since. *sigh*

There are many art projects waiting to be born that I was supposed to get done like yesterday and I can't seem push past the resistance....yet again!

Oh I swear, I wish could just lop off my hands already and be done with it all. Then I couldn't draw or paint or write and wouldn't have to worry about chasing after a dream-career in art!

Aaaaaarrrrrrrgggggggghhhhhhh!!

*pant* *pant* *pant*

Okay, okay, now that I got THAT out of my system, let me show you a piece of mail art I received last week from the wonderful Roland Halbritter!

The front (no space was wasted)!

It's on standard cardboard (flat not corrugated) and measures 4 3/4" x 7 1/2".

The front features a hand-drawn portrait of Charles Darwin and a message to me from Roland asking if I'd like to partake in his current "Otto Von Bismarck" mail art challenge.

But the back. Oh the back!

The backside featuring yours truly!

Now normally I cringe when I see pictures of myself but on the back of this mailing is a pen and ink portrait of me!

Roland explained he drew this with one fluid line, never lifting the pen from the paper. He obviously incorporated my love of the color green into this piece as "Green Dean" fills the negative space of the portrait. Love that!

Thanks, Roland, it's wonderful!!

"Never a dull moment."

Five months ago our family found out my uncle had stage 4 colon cancer. I told my aunt during the initial hospital visit that I'd spend the night by them for just a couple days. I've been helping them out almost every day since!

"It's not easy taking care of a sick person," my uncle told me earlier this week. "One can get impatient, irritated, angry. It's not easy."

Endless hospital visits, long chemotherapy treatments, and going for weekly blood tests. Having to keep track of all the shots he has to get. Neulasta, Neumega, Procrit. Plus changing colostomy supplies daily.

At times it can be exhausting and overwhelming....and I'm not even the one who has cancer!

But if I can make things easier for both of them then it'll be worth it.

Sketch of my aunt and uncle's living room end table

When I'm depressed about not working at the moment, my aunt is quick to point out that it allowed me to help them and that she couldn't do it by herself.

"God sent you to me," she assuredly said. "He wanted you here."

That's a lovely notion. I wonder if God will send someone to me. In time perhaps.....

The 8th chemotherapy treatment is two weeks away and by then we'll know the results of the CT scans to see if the tumor has shrunk or not.

That's how these past several months have been. You never know what the next day will bring. Always a deluge of emotions mixed together. Fear, anxiety, nervousness, relief, gratitude. There are quiet times and then everything happens all at once.

"I tell ya, Dean, there's never a dull moment around here," my aunt joked. "I want more dull moments!"

I couldn't agree more, Auntie. I couldn't agree more.

"Obsessed" (Giveaway!!)

Obsessed - v. To have the mind persistently or abnormally preoccupied with a single emotion or topic.

Weird. Ugly. Different. No, I'm not talking about myself for once! I'm referring to my latest painting.

Several weeks back I mentioned a color combination that just wouldn't let me rest until I used it some form.

Here is what was born!

Mixed media on watercolor paper - 8" x 10" (NFS)

The original concept seemed neat at the time but once the painting was complete, well, I hated it! It was doomed to be ripped up but thanks to a couple helpful bloggers' suggestions, I made some adjustments and now like the finished results....sort of!

I wanted it to be tribal, primitive, and full of emotion but it kind of looks like an alien woman wearing blackface! Fuckity-fuck and super-shit!

Close-up detail

But........

It does the have the color combination I was obsessing over. Red-orange. White. Gray. Black. They're all there. I even managed to incorporate two white squares that were in the original dream I had. I can finally be done with this! Thank goodness!!

Watercolors, ink, and colored pencil brought this figure to life. A wax resist method was used for the gray-on-black texture of her skin. That I especially like and plan on using that technique a lot more from now on.

Close-up detail

Here's the best part. I have decided to give this "unusual" lady away to one of my loyal readers/viewers!

All you have to do is tell me why I'm so wonderful. Kidding! Just list all the wonderful things about me. Again....kidding!

No, just comment on this post as you normally would and you're automatically entered to win this painting! So simple!

I'll leave the giveaway open until the very end of this month and will update this post at the start of March declaring the winner!

Good luck to all of you (if you want it, that is)!

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***Update March 6, 2010***

All of the names have been thrown into a hat and one blogger was picked to win this painting.

The winner is:

robertga99

Congrats Bob!!