Chicken

Chicken / Oil on black canvas / 5x7 / $68 including shipping

sold

LENT STARTED WEDNESDAY, and for the first time in my life, I am participating. The particulars of my journey aren't important, but in general, I am giving up my obsessions for the next 40 days.

My initial idea was to give up candy. That sounded sensible and like something that I could do. Difficult but not impossible, and good for me. I have a very addictive personality, and my craving for candy was getting a little out of control. 

Then I began thinking about Lent, faith, spirituality, the sense of and opportunity for renewal, here in the depths of winter, and I began to see a different path, a more sweeping one that could have more resonance. 

This morning, as I contemplated the next 40 days, as I thought about what obsesses me, and how to leave those things behind - or at least leave them alone - for the next days and weeks, I began to see the amount of time and energy they take in my life, and I was sort of stunned. So even in contemplating all of this, even before starting, I have received a gift - of vision and understanding and, honestly, of time. 

And so the other side of this is to figure out what to do with the extra time and space in my life. During Lent, one is supposed to give more, and give more of oneself in service, and so I am thinking about that, too. 

Are you on a Lenten journey? What are you finding out about yourself, your faith, your spiritual state of being? 

***

Coda

"The moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help that would never otherwise have occurred. A stream of events issues from the decision, raising unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, 
which no man could have dreamt would have come his way." 

-William Murray

Muskrat

Muskrat / Oil on black canvas / 5x7/ $68, including shipping

sold

TUESDAY AFTERNOON, the sun shone, absurdly bright after 10 days or more of rain and gray sky. It was a single day's respite, and it was a beauty - nearly 60 degrees, windy enough to dry some of the huge puddles covering neighbors' lawns, and to blow the rich scent of springtime through the tang of the marsh air. 

Sunrise came well before 7, and sunset at 5:45. And as the afternoon warmed and lengthened, I heard peepers singing! 

Today,  it is cold again. Thursday, the rain returns. But Tuesday, for a moment, spring drew a breath, and here on the shore, we all exhaled in joy together. 

***

Coda

"We have more strength than will; and when we say things are impossible, 

it is often just excuses we make for ourselves." 

- Francois De La Rochefoucauld

Two Snow Scenes

Above, Bridge in the Snow l, oil on black canvas  /sold. 

Below, Bridge in the Snow ll, oil on black canvas, 8x10, $120 including shipping. 

Please email me at carrieBjacobson if you would Bridge in Snow II.

IT'S HARD TO PAINT SOFT WITH A KNIFE. Soft works much better with brushes, though even as I type this, I have a new idea for soft snow scenes. 

I've done a couple interesting fog pieces - softness is required for fog - by making a painting, letting it dry a little, then putting some gray white over the fog areas, and rubbing it off. Of course, it's pretty scary to do this, especially if you like the initial painting. Now I am wondering if a tactic like this might work, also, for snow. I think I will try a third piece, and post it here, in a bit. 

This painting came from a photograph on a plein-air painters group on Facebook. The person who took the picture (I think it's of a scene in Colorado) gave permission for people to paint it, and so I am including it below. 

I really love making snow paintings, but typically - for me, at least - they haven't sold. I was surprised and delighted when this one did! Who knows? Maybe the lower one will sell, too. 

***

Coda

"I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; 

and perhaps it says, "Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again." 

- Lewis Carroll

 Alice's Adventures in Wonderland / Through the Looking- Glass 

February Bouquet

 February Bouquet / Oil on black canvas / 5x7 / $68, including shipping
Please email me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com if you'd like to buy this painting! 

SOON, THERE WILL BE FLOWERS. There will be gardens, and sunshine, hummingbirds and the smell of lawns being mowed. 

Already, here on the Eastern Shore, sunrise is before 7 and sunset after 5:30. Already, I have smelled the scent of spring - unmistakeable, indescribable - on the morning breeze. Already, I've heard the songs of springtime birds. 

Garden catalogs have arrived. Daffodil greenery has poked through the soil on the protected east side of the house. The tips of the trees and bushes along the roadways are starting to redden. My mind has turned to thoughts of mulch. 

We will make it. Spring will come, bringing warm days and new flowers, lush lawns, dogwoods shimmering in deep woods, laughing gulls calling on the breeze, the marsh grasses changing to that thin yellow green, tender with the season, with new life, with rebirth. With survival. 

***

Coda

(love is more thicker than forget)

love is more thicker than forget

more thinner than recall

more seldom than a wave is wet

more frequent than to fail

it is most mad and moonly

and less it shall unbe

than all the sea which only

is deeper than the sea

love is less always than to win

less never than alive

less bigger than the least begin

less littler than forgive

it is most sane and sunly

and more it cannot die

than all the sky which only

is higher than the sky

- e.e. cummings

Gotta Love a Snail

Gotta Love a Snail / Oil on black canvas / 5x5 / $68 including shipping

Please email me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com if you'd like this little guy

A SNAIL MUCH LIKE THIS ONE was the very first painting to sell in the Love series on the Oil & Water Facebook page my friend Susan McGuire and I started recently. (https://www.facebook.com/Oil-Water-104885681569296). 

Not only did it sell about a minute after I posted it, but directly afterwards, several other people contacted me, wanting it - so I made more. 

Here is the final snail Love piece. All my Love paintings had hearts hidden in them (or not so hidden). This one won't be dry in time for a Valentine's Day delivery, but love late is still love, isn't it? 

It always interests me, and often surprises me, when people clamor for certain paintings. Crab paintings took off in somewhat the same way, and the little mountaintop pieces I make up from my imagination, and the leftover paint on my palette, seem to always find a home. 

***

Coda

Flirtation

After all, there's no need

to say anything

at first. An orange, peeled

and quartered, flares

like a tulip on a wedgewood plate

Anything can happen. 

Outside the sun

has rolled up her rugs

and night strewn salt 

across the sky. My heart

is humming a tune

I haven't heard in years! 

Quiet's cool flesh -- 

let's sniff and eat it. 

There are ways

to make of the moment

a topiary

so the pleasure's in

walking through. 

- Rita Dove

 

Nuthatch, Perched

 Nuthatch, Perched / Oil on black canvas / 5x7 / $68 including shipping

Please email me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com if you'd like to have this cutie! 

IN THIS LIFE ALONE, and with the covid, and with the terrible memory I've always had, I've had to find ways to remember to do things. 

A calendar, of course, is a great start, but doesn't work unless I first remember to write stuff down on it, and then remember to look at it. 

I've come to terms with my Alexa device, and use her more and more often to remind me about things - including feeding the dogs. Peter always fed the dogs, and many times after he died, I couldn't remember if I had or hadn't. You'd think they would let me know, but dogs are all about the food. A second dinner would not be a problem for them. Any time during the course of the day, if I rattle their food bowls, they are ready and barking. 

I've learned to count the dogs out loud, not only when they come in, but also when I give them their we-came-in-the-house cookies. Yes, several times, I left one or two of them outside for longer than I should have. Same with leaving the studio. Poor Woody was locked in there for hours on several occasions. Luckily, he is pretty much blind and pretty much deaf, and sleeps pretty much 23 hours a day, so he didn't know - but I was in a panic. 

I have learned that when paintings sell, I should move them from one side of the studio to the other. From the drying wall to the sold wall. More than once, I've sold a painting twice, and have had to make amends.

Lately, I've developed a few tricks to keep myself more or less civilized. I leave the bathroom light on in the morning to remind myself to brush my teeth. 

I load my pockets with gloves and fresh tissues when I come IN from walking the dogs, since I can't seem to remember to make sure I have those things when I go out to walk them. 

But still, I lose things and forget. Months ago, I put my favorite coffee cup somewhere, and have never found it. Last week, I took out a can of potatoes (did you know they made such a thing? I didn't, but got a few cans a while ago for a recipe that required them. They did the job, but are really not very good, so I've been feeding them to Woody, who needs fiber in his diet.) I put that can of potatoes down somewhere and have yet to find it. 

What tricks have you all learned during this covid year, to keep yourselves from slipping off the edge? 

***

Coda

I Go Down to the Shore

I go down to the shore in the morning

and depending on the hour the waves

are rolling in or moving out,

and I say, oh, I am miserable,

what shall--

what should I do? And the sea says

in its lovely voice:

Excuse me, I have work to do.

- Mary Oliver

Coffee Jones

 Coffee Jones / Oil on black canvas / 4x12 / special $68 including shipping! 

sold! 

SUSAN MCGUIRE AND I recently started a page on Facebook called Oil & Water (https://www.facebook.com/Oil-Water-104885681569296). She paints in all media, but primarily watercolor. And I paint nearly exclusively in oils. 

The page is mainly for projects we do together, to challenge ourselves and each other, to mark a season or an occasion - or just for fun. We agreed that everything on the page will sell for $68, including shipping. 

For Valentine's Day, we did a Love project. My plan was to hide a heart in each painting, and I had a good time coming up with the ideas. This is one I've wanted to do for a while. I always enjoy watching the cream make its way through iced coffee - the abstract designs intrigue me, and I enjoy the feeling that twisting cream gives me of floating, of movement, of space and time. And I am a little bit of a coffee freak. 

Usually my 4x12s are more expensive, but I'd run out of 5x7 canvases, so there are a couple on the page that are less expensive than they might be otherwise, and this is one of them. 

You can never really count on the post office, I know, but if you let me know today that you want this painting, it might get to you in time to be an on-time Valentine's Day gift. No guarantees! (And if your valentine really loves you, he or she won't mind if it doesn't reach you quite on time...)

***

Coda

Valentine

simplicity

say sleep

or

shall we

shower

have an apple

you are

as I need

water

shall I move?

do you dream? 

shallow snow

flesh

melt this

- Tom Pickard

Sunset Through the Trees

Sunset Through the Trees / Oil on black canvas/ 8x10/ $120 including shipping

sold

I AM HEALING. I see it nearly every day, sometimes in big steps, sometimes small. And while I am glad for this - because, who wouldn't be? - there is part of me that feels a bit of sorrow about it. Does this make sense? In grieving Peter, in mourning him, I am close to him. Respectful of the life he led, the life we led together. I am with him. 

In healing, I am moving away. I am taking steps on my own. I am learning to live without him. I know this is necessary, and it is what I want, but in a way, I rue my burgeoning independence, my quickening heart, the delight I feel in new adventures, new ideas, new friends. 

I will continue to heal, I know, and to grow and prosper, and find my way in this world without him. I'll  probably never be entirely without sadness, and that is OK with me. That little bit of sadness is as much a link as the memories of joy, of love, and the sharing of our lives. 

***

Coda

You, Therefore

For Robert Philen

You are like me, you will die too, but not today:   

you, incommensurate, therefore the hours shine:   

if I say to you “To you I say,” you have not been   

set to music, or broadcast live on the ghost   

radio, may never be an oil painting or

Old Master’s charcoal sketch: you are

a concordance of person, number, voice,

and place, strawberries spread through your name   

as if it were budding shrubs, how you remind me   

of some spring, the waters as cool and clear

(late rain clings to your leaves, shaken by light wind),   

which is where you occur in grassy moonlight:   

and you are a lily, an aster, white trillium

or viburnum, by all rights mine, white star   

in the meadow sky, the snow still arriving

from its earthwards journeys, here where there is   

no snow (I dreamed the snow was you,

when there was snow), you are my right,

have come to be my night (your body takes on   

the dimensions of sleep, the shape of sleep   

becomes you): and you fall from the sky

with several flowers, words spill from your mouth

in waves, your lips taste like the sea, salt-sweet (trees   

and seas have flown away, I call it

loving you): home is nowhere, therefore you,   

a kind of dwell and welcome, song after all,   

and free of any eden we can name

- Reginald Shepherd