The Heat Comes (and stays and stays and stays) and this and that

The heat has been unrelenting. over 100 heat index. building has been all but impossible but we've managed to keep on building. Today I was staining posts (and using my shirt to wipe the sweat that was dripping off my chin) until I couldn't stand it anymore. Dave had heat stroke last week and was out of commission for 2 days recovering. The heat is suffocating, oppressive, it has a life of it's own.

Due to the creeks near the house we're building being filled mainly with 46 degree artesian spring water, every night now the mist rises out of the creeks, turns into fog that has a life of it's own and spreads out towards us like something out of a horror flick. The cold water hits that warm air (lows of 77 degrees) and condenses into that fog immediately. It comes across the field towards us in soft, undulating waves as if it is truly alive. It is so dark out here (there is only one light off in the distance at our neigbors horse barn), but that light is no match for this fog and soon everything is swallowed and the light itself gives up and disappears into the mist; along with the road, the trees and everything but the night sky filled with thousands of stars, satellites, the occasional plane and comet.

I'm waiting for the mother ship to cruise overhead :-).

In spite of the heat I've still managed to work out, and to do a ton of web coding. I discovered much to my shock, that if I put "Angie Phillips artist" into google, it comes up with the 3rd page of an old website that I haven't updated in years. I only keep it because it holds literally hundreds of photos in the galleries of storage of paintings I did and sold and many of them I don't even remember until I see them. They aren't accessable to the public, they existed only during the time the painting was up for sale and have sat in storage ever since. Who'd have thunk that not even the index.html (the front end) of the site would be what google would have? No idea how it got optimized to show up first but all my testing on various computers shows that yes, indeed, it does, in fact skip the index and the link goes directly to the most outdated page (the site Im talking about is the-fringe-dwellers.com.)

So web coding I've been doing, and I'm not very good but I am competent enough to get it to work and work I have. I've decided to keep this site and use it as a middle man, a "selling" tool to act as a mediary to my 3 etsy shops, since each of the shops has a completely different theme so to speak. I need alot of web organization and so this week I shall push forward on it.

I've been painting as well. And doing other stuff as well. But mostly painting.
DAMMIT I try to not have a "dark" feel to my paintings but I keep on sort of drifting over that way.
Perhaps this week I will only work on things "undark". Or perhaps not :-) It's the heat I say, the dammed heat........

All things unrelated (or disorganization but organized in a strange way)

I've been thinking alot about this lately. I have been trying to focus on getting one idea across before I stumble onto something else but I cannot say how terribly, terribly hard it is. I have been waiting for years to get a chance to pursue art full time and I have so many ideas, wants, wishes and stuff to create with that deciding on what I need to work on is almost impossible.

Oh yes, the "Love never dies" is a print of a painting I did long ago, enhanced and turned into, well, whatever I want with it. I am currently offering it as a print and as a notecard but it was really nice to put words to the idea at long last.

Love never dies is a never ending theme with me. My mother died of cancer and she was pretty much an athiest which made her knowledge of her terminal cancer eat at her in a completely different way than that dammed disease ever did.  In her eyes I saw fear, and doubt and I watched her lovely blue eyes turn inward, into a place that neither I nor anyone else close to her, could follow.  On the day she passed I knew she was gone moments before the phone rang and it was my sister, telling me she was gone. I have incredible faith, not in the traditional way, but in the only way I know and I knew she was okay, and she was set free and that was that. Death to me is never and ending, it's just a transition from one room to another. I didn't learn this in any church, or any book, nor was I ever told this by anyone in this lifetime, that's for sure. I simply brought it with me from someplace else and it's been a truth that has sat in my head for as long as I could think a clear thought. And no, I'm not going to preach anything to anyone  :-). I just paint about it sometimes and I try not to give it the dark edge that so much of my artwork always has.

Since I become a full time artist and woman of, well, wantoness, I have been trying to get everything that's been building in my head out.

I think I need to make dolls. With faces. Painting might be a little two-dimensional for faces although I've been doing some face stuff lately too.

The night comes out here on this land and it is so humid and hot a person could literally cut it with a knife. New moon. Very dark. The coyotes will be thick as thieves tonight, along with everything else that comes out here at night to hunt. At night we are the intruders here and the night is filled with the sounds of things hunting, and other things squealing little horrified squeals of finding themselves the hunted. Life is hard in the country, I'm discovering, for alot of creatures. No, make that for most creatures. Sam lays in the grass in front of the porch (which I'm currently sitting on) and stares out at the night, my silent partner.)

When I look at Sam I know that love never dies. When I think of my Mom I know love never dies.

It's a strangely comforting thought, isn't it?

Pendants

Oh, sweet, sweet fun.
First off, I had a creative spurt and took these wooden african carved pendants and found a delightful stash of old vintage pieces to adorn them with. Pearls, vintage earrings, gold dimensional paint, what's not to love about these? (well, okay if you don't like African carved mask pendants then maybe alot)......
I love old rhinestones and these are especially full of sparkle.  I found them in a glass jar of vintage and antique jewelry at a monestary when I was having a birthday lunch with my friend, Kathy.

I could have stayed there all day, by the way, because the place is just equisite. But fortunately, we both love to root around in old items and double fortunately, Mount Michael has a lovely house you can lunch in complete with tons and tons and tons of wonderful treasures, all for sale. Repurposing them is just an amazing part of the fun and I could play all day long. Who wouldn't love to play in all those jars of sparkling jewels and fun?