This canvas sat on a shelf for almost two months; I loved the texture, loved all the cool text underneath the paint, but couldn't seem to do anything more.
I finished it today, and I want to explain...
Now, I like wind-blown meadows and wide-open fields--but what I really love--really really
really love, and have since I was tiny--are little hidey-hole places in the woods. Where I grew up in Michigan, there were real forests, places where the trees just seemed to go on forever and ever, and while of course you knew that, well, yes, you could lost in there, you also knew that you could get lost in there and
no one could find you. I don't know why that appealed to me so much as a child (and still appeals to me as an adult, mind you) but there you are. I love shady spots with dappled light and the sound of the forest breathing around me. I love how deceptive sound is deep amongst the trees, how repetitive the trunks appear until you look closely and truly see them, standing there patiently with their bark lined like elderly faces. I love the little hollows where years' worth of leaves have gathered for the winter, that good smell of decay and death and growth all mixed together. I said once before on this blog that I heard the trees shrieking as I drove past a fire once--and it didn't surprise me, because I've known all my life that all of everything--life and death and good and bad--live in the forest.
I've known since I was little that if magic were to happen, it would happen in a forest. Maybe that's why I've been dreaming of little houses sheltered by strange and magical trees...
