Common Redpolls (Mr. & Mrs.)

I lightened up this image from what originally showed on my digital camera. Considering all the still existing irreconcilable differences, I still want a divorce!!

Earthquakes are almost as scary as going back to school...

Got rudely woke up this morning by an earthquake. 5.7 is what they are saying. All my paintings and glass objects were rattling and there is always that deep throated rumbling hum that accompanies these things. It is a most insecure feeling. I stayed in bed hoping my overhead light didn't shake loose. Common objects become potential trajectory devices. A reminder that we are vulnerable and at the mercy and whim of Mothernature and that anytime, anywhere disaster can strike. Dontcha love it!!

Even scarier is next week I am going to be taking a couple of classes here at my local university. It has been 10 years since I last took a class. When I do the math, I see that I was still in my 30's when this happened. I feel like such a different person now. So much has happened since then...

So, I am taking a creative writing course that will most likely put me smack in the middle of a bunch of much younger folk. Which I suppose is okay, but knowing that they, in their youth, are going to be more talented than me is a painful notion.

I've never really done any creative writing other than poetry, so this will mostly be all new. Story? Maybe I will come here and beg others to help me with my homework? What if I don't get an "A"? That will be devastating. I am trying to prep myself for that in advance. It is the most likely outcome.

Flipping through my main textbook, I see it caters to youth, trying to relate to their particular lifestyles. When I previously attended classes here and there over several years, I never considered age like I am now. It is difficult to come to terms with a number that defines you when you don't feel it fits. I find myself saying things like, "I am almost 50." Trying on that number as if speaking it will make it less daunting once it reaches down and snatches up me up into that decade. The one that makes me do math and consider with no doubts that I am more than half way through my life...

Blue Tree painting close up

My digital camera and I are having problems on the level of, irreconcilable differences. My Olympus program makes me do handstands to get a pic out of their program's environment and into one that will open as a 'browse-able' file....Arrgghhh. It's really a pain in the ass and really inefficient. I want a divorce!!

Blue Tree painting full view

Painted like two pictures last year....now two pics in a week...

It took me about 15 years to figure out how to get this off my camera and onto Blog. My 12/31 painting...