American Wonders

     Driving a metal box to a sanctioned campsite is a far romantic cry from a yurt, a camel and wilderness without footprints, but this is modern America. Buffalo no longer roam the plains. Rodents and bugs are the last free range creatures.

     I called friends who are currently motoring around Utah in a small RV that they bought second hand and fixed up. People who travel with them sleep in a tent outside. Leveling is done with blocks of wood, hand operated jacks, crawling in the dirt and most likely colorful expletives. When I reached my Dutch friend she was back in cell phone range at a campsite near Bryce Canyon. They had parked their modest camper next to a motor home sizable enough to provide shade. Their travel companions were also from the Netherlands. The exchange with their neighbors started out promising, but went south fast.

     The occupants of the rolling mansion offered a tour and my friends did not hesitate. Who wouldn’t want to see inside? Automated push button self-leveling was to be admired, but that might be where the envy ended. Under the counter lighting, four large TV’s all playing FOX news including the one mounted on the outside defied a spirit of adventure. His brother had purchased the same vehicle at a quantity discount. The owner of the giant RV inquired about the visiting couple’s occupations. Which is one way of determining status in America, but there could have been another reason. He was amazed that anyone could sleep in a tent outside of an RV. He must have wanted an explanation, but didn’t get one. The tent dwellers didn’t admit to being doctors either.     

     One of the Dutch people asked, “Is the budget crisis going to be resolved”, because they were concerned that national parks might be closed. The question had nothing to do with politics, but the response gave the foreign traveler’s a taste of America similar to chewing on aluminum foil. The owner of the large footprint, gas guzzling, broadcaster of mainstream crap news, self-leveling, ambient lit, wilderness experience behemoth blurted out, “Once we get that monkey out of the White House everything will go back to normal.”

      I pictured my friend’s faces while they stood in the belly of the beast listening to a derogatory, hypocrite’s opinion. It’s a free country so I would also add, fucking asshole. My friends must have needed a monumental amount of self-control not burst out laughing or take issue.

      And it gets better. The mammoth RV had the name “Dutch Star” plastered across the side and their shit drain pipe was connected to a sewer outlet directly under the picnic table where actual Dutch people sat for dinner. Welcome to America, which apparently used to be normal. 

    

      

Sites

              Paintings on the web: 

                                   catherinebuchanan.com

                                   thebuddhaproject100.com

                                   sadieshotels.com

              Currently in the real world:

                         Ho'olehua Airport and Pu'u O Hoku Ranch, Molokai                                         Yankee Pier Restaurant, United Terminal, SFO

                         Sadie's by the Sea, American Samoa

Dinner Out, Fish Story Restaurant, Napa, California

 Feleti Barstow Public Library in American Samoa purchased 30 original paintings, but have yet to hang them. I believe they can be viewed on request.    

Crossroads

      Somehow I lost touch with the typing feature on my computer. Creativity comes and goes like a cyclic tide or this year like the transit of Pluto, a slow crawl in the dark. It has been a year of loss, injury and too much work. My parents are gone and I miss them.

      Uncharted territory looms. Blank canvases, empty pages and new paths to choose. Freedom is daunting.

       The project I was involved in for the last few years, painting the image of Buddha with a friend, came to a close. Or it did for me. It might be true that money and art are incompatible. We did well painting together, and then more time was spent showing and selling than in the studio and creativity waned. We did some lovely paintings and I wish Arthur Deak and the Buddha Project well.

    It will be good to know what's next. For now anticipation is my best friend. 

The Art of Love

     Recently my friend Bill commissioned a painting of himself and his wife. Sadly, Dottie passed away a year ago and she is sorely missed. The image is a fond remembrance of a moment they shared. She often wore his shirts at the beach to hide from the tropical sun, nearly disappearing in them.

     Dottie championed healthy choices with kindness, sincerity and compassion. Her words of wisdom helped me quit smoking. As I worked on the painting conversations with Dottie played in my mind. She was the most naturally moderate person I’ve known, but then I never asked if she struggled to make sensible decisions because she never complained. Remarkably over the last few weeks I’ve found myself back at the gym and no longer buying comfort food.      

     Remembering Dottie's kind words and concern, where I often have not found them for myself, has been the gift of doing this painting. It takes someone who is not an addict to elevate one. It takes love.

An Ideal Heaven for Curious Minds

     There are so darned many unanswered questions. Why do we do what we do? Like blurt out personal feelings to total strangers, lie for no reason and overreact to imagined slights? Don’t you really want to know? Why is it so hard to keep both socks? Where did that $100 bill go? What does disease mean or is it just random bad luck? How on Earth can we be so loving and so hateful nearly in the same breath? What flips that switch? Or why did I blindly go along with my ex-husband's suggestion to name a cute little budgie Desenex after an anti-fungal cream when I thought it was idiotic?

      It is stupidly unfair that there are so many big and small mysteries over the course of a lifetime. What I sincerely hope for is that when we die we can go to a big, beautiful place called ‘The Library of What the Fuck’. There we can find truthful answers for all those times we had to ask, "What the fuck?" while on Earth. I want the whole truth, a comfortable chair (cloud?), good coffee and eternity if necessary to look it all up. Before I had a chance to surf the web I had this notion that I’d be able to find meaningful answers on the web. While how to paint a car, choose a camera or find a purebred hamster may be informative there are few answers to what really makes us tick. Why didn’t I love men who were good for me and cling to the ones who were not? Why don’t I want to work out knowing how good I feel after? Why is impressionistic painting so difficult when it looks so easy? 
     The second painting I did of a boy holding a cat I can clearly remember a moment of feeling freedom with paint. It flowed off the brush effortlessly while I added the background weeds with a few perfect strokes. That it happened so well on my second painting is a mystery. It has rarely happened since and not for lack of effort. In my experience painting is usually a series of accidents, corrected until they look right. Impeccable control with a brush has proved frustratingly elusive. Thanks Goya and Thiebaud for such fine examples, but how did you do it? Or more precisely, how can I? It is another question for my ideal library, but it’s not over yet and today is another hopeful day.  

Slippahs, from the series 90 Paintings in 90 Days, 2011

 

evidence of effort