We're back home after a trip to Washington and Virginia where we saw wonderful people get married, enjoyed the company of a great hospitable old friend, and wandered until we could no longer wander. The coming home and starting back into well-worn routines was tricky but then I looked in the backyard to find big fat redder than red oriental poppies blooming. These were plants I didn't think much of; bought 'em at a YMCA neighborhood plant sale and stuck 'em into the ground last year but ... they rocked my garden.

Today I came home from work to find some kind of varmit bit the heads off a bunch of 'em but still, I'm happy with my poppies.

One of the finds of my museum-going in DC was Honore Sharrer at the Reynolds center. Big ideas and little brushes. That pretty little housewife made a magnificent painting with so much to tell about America and I spent a good chunk of time looking.

take care,
Rachael

I saw my family this weekend and there's an odd thing about the similarities between my brother's art and mine. Sure, we had the same art teachers in school, went to the same art college, and constantly kept our own sketchbooks. But as I travelled across the state via train, I sketched a crowd of people. A few hours later in the living room of our parents house, my brother doodled as I talked. He was drawing a crowd of people.

I think that says something about our love of art and fascination with people. Also, maybe can spur you to draw, too.

take care,
Rachael

My backyard is an almost. I have put my square foot boxes in and some plots of topsoil/peat moss/ and other good stuff. The kitchen windows have lots of dixie cups full of dirt and sprouts. I am so hungry for the garden salad, for the sprouts to grow into things I will cook up, for all the potential energy to be actual.

goodnight,
Rachael

I'm sitting in an almost abandoned University library the day after graduation. I'm mostly here to look up details and ideas for my short story gone astray (in my short short a feminist historian takes a job as a tour guide at the Margaret Mitchell house and wacky hijinks ensue...well, not really, but I wanted to write that). I've got this book sitting next to me and I truly have looked at it a couple of times.
But I am also wondering if I want to wear my art history hat again and start taking classes towards a possible phD in visual studies. It would be more than 11 years after I earned an MA in art history and a grad certificate in museum studies. 11 years after I realized that I liked writing a zine and teaching 2nd graders to make cartoons more than I liked sitting in the library. But I keep getting pulled back to art history and visual studies questions. I seem to be addicted to going back to school (yep, I am currently enrolled in two non-credit classes and I can't really remember a time when I wasn't taking or teaching something), it could be a fine lark.
Did I really just write that? Did I seriously think I might have fun to go back to the land of graduate studies?
That's what I intend to find out. Can I jump feet first into juicy research? Can I learn at my own pace (in the pockets of free time I have left over after full-time job, painting, gardening, being a real friend, and maybe even someday raising a rugrat)? Can I learn in a collaborative not combative environment? Can I ask questions of a public nature (who has access to art? How do artists find communities?) and then find ways to apply the answers to real situations?
Of course there is still a process of application and what not, but now it's time to sit outside in the sun a bit and then bend the ear of the head of the department. I figure my gut has been good about leading me to good situations and environments where I can learn, contribute, help in some way so today is a chance to test it. Sure I might decide not to apply and sure they might decide not to accept me but it's all a learning process and I need to have some gumption.

take care now,
Rachael

I'm busy tying together some loose strands of ideas into one coherent short story. It's certainly not brewed yet but my class includes a lot of workshopping (where we will be reading and critiquing each other's stories) so I am trying to get a draft that others can read. I'm remembering how much I like to make up stories. Controlling other people's lives is a real joy, particularly when there are few real-life consequences.

The lilacs in my backyard are in full glorious bloom now. Smelling delightful.
And this finally, is a photo from my penland adventure last year. I had just met these two little boys and we were having a high time of painting.

take care,
Rachael