Of course any day that involves enjoyment must involve a little humor too.
So Happy Father’s Day to all.

Happy Fathers Day

I remember spring actually being a season, like when I was a kid. Where it lasted for five or six weeks, flowers bloomed, and grasses went from winter browns to a lovely spring green and oh yes, those beautiful, gentle spring rains … but no more. Times are a changin’ … and it’s a damn good thing there’s no global warming … can you imagine?!

I’ve been feeling reasonably well, you know the routine, good days and bad days and that’s to be expected. I do find the hot weather equally as bothersome as the extreme cold of winter. It tends to drain my energy at an uncontrollable rate … it’s difficult to explain. Draining might be the word, but then again … just the simple act of getting older, is draining in itself.

Dealing with cancer on a day to day basis does have it’s challenges, and just like everyday life, we have to rise above them and push forward and onward. No different then anyone or anything else that you wish to move above.

This past weekend, to my total surprise, I heard Alberic playing a tune on his guitar that I hadn’t practiced with him or taught him. I listened, and recognized the melody but couldn’t bring the name of the song to mind. He saw me listening and asked if I knew the tune. I replied yes, but that I couldn’t remember the name. He played several riffs again, I listened again.

You know how it is when you know what something is, and just can’t remember exactly what it is you knew. Yet another sign of getting older? … gee, could it be?

After listening again I finally asked what the name of the song was. My twelve year old Alberic casually replied “it’s ‘The Drunken Sailor’ Dad, ever hear it?”. At first I thought to myself “why the hell is a twelve year old playing songs about drunken sailors” … and then I started to think about the tunes I played when I was learning to play and realized that it (The Drunken Sailor) wasn’t really that bad. I played lot’s of old crazy songs when I was young, and to be honest … I still do!

The Drunken Sailor is a traditional sea shanty … a folk song, and like most old folks songs there are dozens, if not hundreds of verses. I mean that’s what makes it a folk song … folks adding their own lyrics and passing it down. Hey, someday I’ll write about folk songs … it’s a great topic.

I smiled and acknowledged his skill at playing it, asked him to show me the chord structure … in which he immediately got up and walked over to the keyboard (even though he was playing guitar), and proceeded to explain the chords and structure to the song.

Then we sang a few verses:
Chorus:
What’ll we do with a drunken sailor,
What’ll we do with a drunken sailor,
What’ll we do with a drunken sailor,
Earl-aye in the morning?

Put him in the long boat till he’s sober,
Put him in the long boat till he’s sober,
Put him in the long boat till he’s sober,
Earl-aye in the morning?

Shave his belly with a rusty razor,
Shave his belly with a rusty razor,
Shave his belly with a rusty razor,
Earl-aye in the morning?

Put him in bed with the captain’s daughter,
Put him in bed with the captain’s daughter,
Put him in bed with the captain’s daughter,
Earl-aye in the morning?

Hmmm … I think he’s getting a real handle on this music stuff … amazing how fast kids can learn. Keyboard, drums and guitars, our house is starting to look like a music store! …. but you know, that’s just fine with me

But here we are now, a year later, healed and in decent shape, considering all that went down last year, and hoping this year will be better than ever! It’s certainly starting off that way! We had a great holiday season and for the first time in my life not only did we have fun …. we also got the house cleaned up and most of the decorations put away! Now that’s a first for me … usually my holiday decorations remain in place until at least mid February … but not this year.

So in the spirit of keeping this short and sweet, I wish everyone a Happy New Year and let’s hope we all have a better year.

Peace, Love and Happiness to all.

We’re celebrating our Holiday on Sunday and Monday (due to family logistics) … I hope to be doing some serious cooking and merry making … and hope you are too. It’s that time of year to chill out a bit and enjoy life … I know I’m going to be.

If you don’t know what to do with yourself …. go listen to some great music on www.StreamingOldies.com , they have some of the best Streaming tunes on the internet! … and better then that … it’s free. Awesome Christmas stream too! I’m listening , while I’m writing this.

Speaking of music, I picked up an old 1972 Hagtrom “Swede” (made in Sweden, not far from where my family comes from), six string electric guitar … beautiful worn. Plays better then a brand new Les Paul! …. I love it. Besides, it let’s Alberic and I “jam” together .

Anyway, have a great holiday, and remember those less fortunate then you are and be thankful for what you have … I know I am.

Thank you all.
Have a Happy and Peaceful Holiday Season!

Last year at this time, my spirits were pretty darn low and with a grim outlook on the future, I have to admit that I was taking beating from all sides, both mentally and physically. But things have settled a bit since then, and thanks to the un-ending support from friends, family and even strangers, I’ve learned not only to do the “live one day a time” thing, but to also appreciate and enjoy the time I do have and make the best of it… and that’s what I’m most thankful for.

Yeah, I know I’m not going to last forever … but then, who is? It’s been a struggle at times to keep my mind-set straight and moving forward … but I think it’s an important point. Not only for me, but for those around me, and those watching. I want others in my situation to know they can do it too. That’s one of the reasons I wanted to continue to work, accomplish things, continue learning … keep pushing, and not give up.

It’s an important lesson for children too, they need to understand that when you give up, you lose.

It’s a dual weekend for us, Thursday was Thanksgiving and Sunday was my birthday, so of course we combined those into one, long weekend party. I was born on Thanksgiving Day in 1952 so it’s always been a really special time at our house.

Thanksgiving Day (Thursday), Sher and I had a quiet day by ourselves, we made a nice dinner and relaxed a bit … armed with the full knowledge that the weekend was going to be the busy time for our house. Friday we did some of the cooking and preparation so that we could spend time with the kids while they were here … and that worked out well.

Finally, Saturday arrived and it begin early and kept going … I’m sure you know how that is, even though we prepared ahead of time, it’s still hectic when it hits. My energy level held out reasonably well (even surprised myself), considering … we played games, cards, talked … all the things you do around the holiday table. The Wii got a work-out as well … between the bowling, golf and all those type games, with a house full of kids …. I felt like I got a work-out too!

I’ve been teaching my little guy (Alberic) to play guitar … we even got a little time to practice. He just loves Beatles music and I’ve been trying to learn as many Beatles songs, as fast as I can, to help teach him, and I must add, with some reasonable success. He’s doing pretty good. He’s also been playing on the RockBand games, so between that, and then again on real guitars, he’s been learning fast!

A few hours after dinner we did the birthday celebration. Now I don’t want to sound crabby or anything … but to be honest, I never really got “into” my birthday most of my life … how could I? I was always working, or cooking Thanksgiving dinner for others … never really had the time or desire that matter, to enjoy my own day … but this year it felt different. I really did enjoy the day. So lovely to have family around, others sending email, text messages, phone calls … it really was a wonderful day for me. For the first time I can honestly say, that really enjoyed the day (not counting the time when I was a youngster of course) … and there’s a lot of folks to thank for that too.

I heard from a slew of people and it felt really good, a real spirit lifter to say the least. Sunday went the same way, busy and fun. By Monday, I was pretty burnt out, definitely out of energy and in need of a rest … but got up early, took Alberic to school and went off to work in the spirit of being thankful to still be able to work, and to have a job to go to.

So this is a thanks, a thanks to everyone … it was much appreciated by myself and my family for making it special Thanksgiving and a special birthday … we love you all.

I’d also like to give a special thanks to Judy G … you’ll never know how surprised we were, and how Alberic’s “jaw” hit the ground when he saw it … it made the day for both of us!

… and for the dude that brought the GPS system … that saves me approximately 56 trips a week, up and down my stairs! … it’s literally a life saver

Thank you all … and I truly hope your holiday was as fun as ours was.

Well I was really looking forward to this weekend! Three whole days off from everything … no work, no nothing. I figured I could finally get a few things done around the house, maybe a little work on the website, oh and maybe even work on my Cancer Tracker a little. Alberic wasn’t here this weekend so I usually take advantage of that time and get as much done as possible. Instead, somehow I managed to sleep the whole weekend away! Oh well, guess I needed it … sure feeling well now though!

Damn, Just What I Needed!

Truth be told, my weekend didn’t really start off sleeping like that … it started like this. I had gotten home from work a little early on Friday and thought I’d try and get to bed a bit early so that I could start my weekend off trying to do some of these little things I’ve been trying to do. With three days off in a row I figured I’d get some things done and some rest too … right? That balance that I struggle to keep going without reaching exhaustion isn’t always easy to find.

I got up early Saturday morning feeling pretty energetic and decided I’d cut some of the lawn (hopefully for the last time this year), so I went out into the barn and started the tractor. Now, anytime I plan to do something like this these days (but this I mean physical work), I take a dose of medicine before I start. The idea behind this is that I know I’ll be sore and hurting later … so I put the meds to work right away. Even though it’s strong stuff and does affect your judgment ( I never drive and take this stuff), doing little things around the house always seems to go OK. I may work a little slower, but that’s OK … I simply take my time and get the job done.

Sher wanted to run to store and grab some items for dinner and said she’d be back in a few minutes. So it left the dog, cats, and myself at home. Now you have to understand that our dog is really attached to Sher, she literally freaks out every time Sher leaves the house. She doesn’t go totally crazy, but she cries and whimpers while she waits for Sher to return.

Every now and then she’ll let out a bit of a howl (she’s a beagle and she’s good at that). Anyway, I just start to get to cutting and I decide to cut around the dogs fenced in area first. I take the tractor right up to the edge of the metal fence and cut along the edge as close as I can, and then down along the other side. I cut really close in hopes of not having to weed-wack along the edge.

Well, just as I start to cut within an inch of the fence, the dog comes out of the house, onto the deck (yep, she has a doggie door so we don’t HAVE to walk her) and let’s out the scariest,  loudest, blood curdling howl, I every heard any animal make, let alone my dog!

Now you have to remembered, it’s a beautiful quiet morning, sunshine, cool air and I’m a little bit “zoned” from the meds, and listening to the steady humm of the tractor engine running, which is already pretty loud … it’s a Zen thing … you know, you get into it and go with the flow.

The howl was so loud that it startled me … I mean really startled me. I jumped, I jumped right off the seat of the tractor … I mean that, my butt actually lifted off the seat when she howled! As I did this (really it was some sort of involuntary action), I twisted the wheel of the tractor and cutting carriage caught the edge of the fence … which of course, started to come along with the tractor.

I hit the brakes and cut the engine as quickly as I could (which unfortunately for the fence wasn’t quite quick enough). My first thought was that I run the dog over some how … and yelled out “damn it” … with that I saw the dog run back into the house like she knew what she’d done. Man, I was pissed and now I had to spend the energy I had unraveling the fence and tractor.

I was able to repair the fence easy enough but had to order a few small parts for the tractor carriage … what a way to start the day. Yeah, I laughing now … but I was hopping mad!

OMG … Now That Was Funny!

A few weeks ago, I really needed to get my oil changed in the new Toyota. I had tried setting up an appointment with the dealership where I had bought it, but after two phone calls asking for an appointment and receiving no reply, I decided to bring it right down the street to a friend that has worked on many of my cars over the years. OK, maybe that sounds a little weird, but it’s my habit to bring new cars back to the dealership where I purchased them for at least the first year or while they’re still under factory warranty.  After the car is a few years old then I bring it my local mechanic.

Anyways, I needed the oil changed and a new inspection sticker (it’s one year old now), so I decided that on the way home from work I’d stop by and ask if I could bring it by in the morning (before work), for a quick service.  However as the day wore on, and the time came to leave work for the day I found myself getting really, really tired and decided that maybe I’d put all this off until tomorrow or some other time, even though I really wanted it done.

But as I approached the auto shop (very close to home), I thought again to myself that I should really do this NOW. It’s in my nature to try and do things right then and there when the opportunity arrives. I hate putting things off until tomorrow because they often slip away and never happen … and that’s not me.

So as tired as I was (and always am at the end of the day), I decided it’s a now or never thing and pulled into the shop. As always, my friend came out to greet me and ask what was up. He knew in general I didn’t bring my new cars into the shop. I explained about the auto dealership not calling me back, and that I was due in Boston in a day or two and wanted to get at least my oil changed before I took that long drive.

As always, he was ready to help. He said if I hopped out of the car he’d do a quick oil change, inspection and get me back on the road in twenty minutes or so. I thought to myself, great! … that’s just perfect. I’m less than five-minutes from home, I can do this. I got out, handed him the keys and headed into his office to wait.  I figured I take my medicine and let start to work while waiting …. this way can take my nap as soon as I get home.

In the spirit of making a short story even shorter, I fell fast asleep on the couch in the waiting room, while waiting for my car. He had nice comfy couch and I was alone so I stretched out and was gone to dreamland in minutes.  Now my friend knows that I have cancer but doesn’t really understand much about it. He just simply knows I’m sick, go to Boston for treatments and return.  He helps keep my car in tiptop shape for those trips.

After awhile, I felt something poking at me … hard, really shaking my body, but being woken from a deep,  sound sleep,  I really wasn’t even sure where I was and kind of ignored it. Little while later … Boom! … again I feel something shaking me and I’m stlll having trouble opening my eyes.

Sher has been telling me for months that I’m not the light sleeper I used to be and the medicine I’ve been taking isn’t helping that situation either.

A third time, but this time it’s really a violent shake! I slowly come around and open my eyes to see a blurry vision of my friend holding something in his hand, his son is standing next to him. He had a look of relief and concern on his face. I hear him say, “Man, we thought you were dead or something!”  … “It’s six o’clock and we’re closing but we didn’t know if you were alright, we were just about to call Sher, or the police, or the 911 emergency line”! “we tried like four or five times to wake you up … but you weren’t moving”.

Now I’m awake …. well sort of.  I started to laugh when I saw the look on their faces. I made no excuses, just smiled and held my hand out for the keys, and made my way out the door without paying for their service or anything … got in my car and drove up the road to my house.

Of course the next day I stopped by and explained a little. Since then we’ve all laughed it off … but I can see a nervous look on his face every time I pull in .

Th -th- th- thats all folks!

Well I guess those stories  weren’t as short as I thought, or they took me longer to write then I expected they would … but my writing time is up for the day. I have a few more that ought to go in the humor section … which I don’t have on this website, but I think I’ll set one up for the future.

I never realized how difficult it is to write out a humorous situation or story. I don’t think I’ve ever tried before. It’s definitely challenging to say the least. Not sure how I did with this but I will say, there is some humor to living with cancer, and a lot of truth to the old adage that laughter is the best medicine … which I totally believe in. Thanks for taking the time to read this.

So what did I do with all this time on my hands? Well, today’s weather was just the perfect Vermont summer day. There’s a wonderful breeze, about seventy-five to eighty degrees and just simply lovely. What a day to be alive! I decided I’d take a short walk through our woods and check things out.

I haven’t walked our property very much this past year and with no one around I could take my time, move at my own pace, and rest whenever I wanted to. Not that others rush me, but I always feel obliged to try and keep up with others and not slow the pace too much.
For those that walk through the woods now and then, you know the forest and streams are always changing. They grow and the stream change shape with new twists and turns. New trees and plants pop up, and you can usually see the tracks of deer and moose and others that pass through in search of food, water and refuge.

I love walking the forest and the peace of mind that comes from spending time there. I mean just think about the word forest … “for-rest” … need I say more? I always feel like I can think clearer after a walk, I’m more in touch with myself, my emotions, and it always increases creative thought. After walking through the woods I always want to spend the rest of my day writing, painting or playing music. For me, it’s the biggest “turn on” when it comes to creativity and keeping that edge sharp.

Today I took my camera and walked the trails I’ve cut and maintained over the years. The ponds and streams were full of fish, frogs and others, splashing as I walked by as if to say “come join us”. One section of the trail follows the stream a distance and it was simply incredible to see all the life in the water. That’s one of the great things about having ponds and stream to walk … everything in the forest comes for water, so it’s always lively. I crossed a deer run and saw those fresh little “rasinettes” as evidence that they’d recently traveled through on their way to drink.

I stopped to rest under a large old tree that’s been there long before I ever discovered this place. I sat on the ground resting my back against it’s trunk listening to the birds and other noises that always fill the forest up. It was so peaceful I almost fell asleep … well, not asleep, but more like a daydream.

All these thoughts were going through my mind about how much the forest changed since the last time I’d traveled through, and the cycle of nature always renewing itself. Dying and being reborn, how the leaves drop from the trees each year and others return to take their place, how the wild flowers drop their seeds for the next generation, and how everything is intertwined and dependant on each other for survival.

I also thought about how I (and all people in general), fit into this scheme of natures renewal and found myself in a deep state of peacefulness that I haven’t felt or been in touch with for a long time. You know, I stopped and “smelt the roses” you might say. A wonderful experience to say the least.

As I stood up to start making my way back to the house, I walked about five steps away from the tree and turned back around to looked at it. I took a photo of it, my intent had been to take many photos today, but somehow this was the only one I came home with. Below is the photo I took. Click on it and you’ll see a larger version.

I had forgotten that almost ten years ago Sher, I and Alberic had hung masks and some other objects on many of the trees throughout our property. Alby always considered them magic trees, maybe trees that the Ewoks (from Star Wars) lived in. Today, after ten years, these tree hangings paid off in a big way for me. I hope you enjoyed this tale as much as I enjoyed the experience. It made me realize … that I really never was alone after-all.

I ran down to our local butcher shop and bought two boneless pork chops, stopped at the farm stand and grabbed some wonderfully fresh picked sweet corn. That is one thing I have to say about Vermont, during the season when fresh corn is available, Vermont has some of the best sweetest corn money can buy.

I picked up a few more things and made my way back to the house.

Prep in the afternoon: Now this may sound like a complex recipe but actually it’s rather simple and doesn’t require much time to prepare and almost no time to cook. Of course that’s one of the great things about most Asian cooking styles, they cook quickly … which in turn, if your food is fresh and healthy, you end up with a fresh, delicious, healthy meal with limited effort.
So prior to cooking anything, I took the time to prepare all the veggies for stir-frying. The prep, is key for this type of cooking.

First thing I did was to put a pot of water on the stove for cooking the noodles, basically blanching them ahead of time and then finishing them in the stir-fry at the last minute. After blanching them, I cooled them off, mixed in a little oil so they didn’t stick and put them in the refrigerator for later. I simply wanted to have them ready to go.

Then I cut all the veggies (except the bok choy) a little larger then match stick size and placed them in a bowl and placed them back in the refrigerator. The bok choy I cut into larger pieces, similar to those in a Chinese restaurant and put them in cold water, back in the frig to crisp up prior to cooking.

As for amounts, I was only cooking for Sher and I, and we have a lot of ingredients so I used only a little of each item. Besides, I never measure anything. Good food, is good food and if you use the freshest ingredients you can … your dish will be great!

Next I peeled the sweet corn and prepared it for cooking too. My plan was to have a big pot of boiling water ready to go when I started the stir fry, so I only had to drop the corn in at the last moment. The corn (actually all this stuff) was grown by a local farmer that’s right down the block from us. Well, not the bok choy …. but everything else. A friend stopped by with some fresh garden yellow squash and zucchini so I decided to add a little bit of that too.

Then I prepped the meat for cooking. I took two boneless pork chops and trimmed all the fat from them. Sliced the meat in small match stick like shapes, added the paper thin slices of garlic, good shake of celery seed (you know that stuff you never know what to do with) and covered it with some Szechuan stir fry sauce and placed it too in the frig to marinate.

Now my prep was ready. My guess is that it took about twenty minutes to do this. I had all my ingredients ready to go including the blanched noodles (I used flat Lo mein style), aqll the veggies cut up, marinated meat, and the corn was ready to cook.

The idea of this dish was to have a lightly spicy stir-fry with steamed sweet corn on the side.
Now let’s talk about the cooking method. Like all stir-frys there are two methods that can be used. One is Chao and one is Bao. The difference is all about the temperature and the speed in which the food is cooked. For this dish I’m using the Bao method … which is an extremely hot pan (yep, smoking oil), and very fast cookery. You can probably google those terms and get specific differences … but that’s gist of it.

To start I put the corn in the boiling water and let it start to cook.
With the pan very hot (pre-heated), I used a roundo (french saute pan, but a wok or any pan that can handle high heat will do), a good amount of wok oil in it, I added the red and green peppers, onions, yellow squash and zucchini. I let them acquire a light brownness on the edges (about one minute), gave them a stir and removed them to a side dish. With the pan empty again I added the marinated meat … same process (on a side dish), then I added the bok choy and let that cook a minute.

At this point I added the meat and veggies back to the pan and a good handful of the pre-cooked noodles. A good splash of the szechuan sauce, tossed it with a fork to mix it and removed it from the heat. The whole cooking process was less than five minutes.
The spicy-ness of the szechuan sauce and the sweetness of fresh corn are perfect together. Even though we served the corn as a side dish. Could’ve cut it off the cob and added it … but it was some of the first fresh corn of the season and deserved to be enjoyed with all it’s natural sweetness by itself. Almost sweet enough for a dessert.

Yeah, I know, I should be spending my time working and taking care of clients and business … but sometimes it’s nice just to take a break and do something different. Besides, what else would I be doing on a Saturday night?

Ingredient List:
2 boneless pork chops (or chicken, shrimp, beef … whatever)
Bok Choy (washed, sliced and put in a bowl of ice cold water and refrigerated)
Yellow Squash (slightly larger than match stick size)
Zucchini (same size)
Red Pepper (same size)
Green Pepper (same size)
Onion (match stick size)
garlic (sliced paper thin

Flat Lo Mein Noodles
Fresh Sweet Corn – simply steamed

The finished dish! Enjoy the weekend!

My interest in this has become intense over the last several weeks because I really believe this is something a person cannot see on their own, and because of that, it’s almost impossible to work on, or improve your emotion health … or for that matter, simply understanding it.

Your emotional well being at a time when something like cancer strikes, is as important as the treatment the doctors are giving you … I believe that. But it’s hard to track what’s going on over a period of time without the ability to look back and see how things are changing.

By mining the data that’s recorded in the database, patterns can appear that are effecting your emotional well being without you ever realizing it. Sleep patterns, depression patterns, stress, can all be seen in a graph. Laid out so you can see what days and times certain emotions are running high, is an important factor in trying to control and understand how your feeling during cancer.

Although I’m not a big believer in the positive attitude thing (a positive attitude will heal you), I am a big believer in having the knowledge and understanding about where things stand and what areas I could improve upon, leading me to a better life quality. The idea of avoiding a stressful thing for example, could lead me to a better day in general … and that’s what I’m looking for.

For example, if I were to find that every Tuesday afternoon was a stressful time for me, it’s gives me something to investigate and hopefully work on reducing that stress.

In a real-life case, I found that one of my medicines worked much, much better, if I took it an hour or more earlier then I had been. The medicine was effecting my appetite in a way that interfered with my family’s meal time. The time I was taking the medicine and the time that we had always had dinner, were in conflict with each other.

Every time I sat down to eat dinner, even if I had just cooked it myself, I just couldn’t eat. If I waited an hour or so longer, my appetite returned. But this effected the rest of the family. Seeing this pattern, helped me adjust a lot of stress out of our household. Being ill is no fun for anyone including your loved ones around you … so any adjustments you can make that can help that, is good for the entire household and your health as well.

The program has a purpose, and a powerful one at that. In the near future I will be revealing parts of this program for you see how it works in real life. The key here is “ask the right questions and you’ll get the right answers” …. More to come about this.

So why did I name this post “The Art of Emotional Health”? Well, besides tracking our emotional health in a database, there are others ways of adjusting and helping our emotional health that have nothing to do with databases, computers or writing software, or anything of that nature.

A friend sent me some recent photos of abstract paintings that I thought I’d share with you. As in looking at any piece of art, and especially abstract art, the artist’s meaning is often not known. Abstract art can be seen by a thousand people and have a thousand interpretations. So we have to say, that the artist’s intent, is as real as is commonly accepted, even if we can’t see or feel it.

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What does that mean? It means, that if you can’t see or feel an emotion or intent from the painting, then it is you that is weak, and not the artist. You need to use your imagination to “feel” the art. We have no idea what message he or she was trying to convey at the time of the painting, we need to add our own ”intent” to the art.

What does it mean to me? You have to do the same for you when looking at abstract art. I even gave them my own names and a short review. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did and continue to.

Painting One: The Cardinal

My initial glance at this gave me the feeling of a Spring cardinal (you know those little red birds). Just simply because of the angle at which the red was applied to the canvas.

Then, under closer examination of the entire painting I realized there was so much more to it, but that I was on the right track. The heavily stroked grey center told me that a storm was about to move in, the swirling of the grey strokes just screamed out turbulence in weather.

Looking at the background colors and the division of those two colors, I saw that the left-hand side was Spring time moving in, with it’s warmth and brightness. The right-hand side was winter, being literally pushed off the canvas by the grey storm clouds. I love this painting. The mottled tones of the background and the bright red are in such contrast, as though nature was fighting to solve it’s own problems, balance itself out. Like the ying and the yang … so powerful indeed. Balance, with Springtime winning out!

Painting Two: New Growth

This painting caught my eye immediately after looking at “The Cardinal” and I couldn’t help seeing the Springtime here too … maybe this was a series of paintings on a theme? The “End of Winter” possibly. Lighter on top, and darker on the bottom tells me that New Growth is about to rise from the ground and the darker underbrush is about to be replaced by Springs wonderful warmth that allows all things to grow. I am more and more convinced that this is a series of “winter’s end, and spring beginning” of paintings.

Painting Three: And The Two Shall Meet

This last painting just floored me. All this rolled into one scene was just the right emotion to show here. I see that “The Cardinal” character is back, standing next to “New Growth” (you can see them both standing in the background), as they leave from the depths of Mother Earth with it’s fiery volcanoes and unknown darkness, bringing us, or giving birth to the light and sunshine of a new Spring and Summer season. Life goes on here … and the continuation of the world is confirmed by the artist … just fantastic!

Now that I’ve showed you these paintings, reviewed them, and expressed the emotional content they drew out of me … I love these paintings, and I’d like you, to interpret them in your own way. They are abstract and can have many meanings and messages … this is what I saw, and I felt.

Emotions, whether in a database, on piece of paper or whatever, need to be dealt with, but you need to have the data or information behind them, in order to understand and deal with them on the proper level. Understanding where it comes from is half the battle … understanding why you’re emotional or why your emotions rise and fall is all part of watching what can happen when circumstances change in your life.

So now I’ll tell you that these paintings were done by my friend, five year old Alex Hansson in Uppsala, Sweden … and aren’t they just fabulous!

Can you see what I see?
Can you see at all?

Thank you Alex, thank you for your painting, and for your emotional uplifting.

Aren’t kids the best!