Do you have a ''happy place''? It may be worthwhile having one......

I wanted to paint a place, a place that was still, a place that

was beautiful and full of colour. A place with space for

the imagination to run free, a place that is absent of

the confines of any kind of judgment, and of

critical and limiting thoughts.

A place that I could visit when the world seemed

colourless, arduous, baffling and complex to the point

of appearing insurmountable.

 I stared at the white canvas on the easel waiting for the ''muse''

to stir my imagination. Nothing. I closed my eyes.

(I had discovered that sometimes it was easier to ''see''

when I closed my eyes.)

Suddenly, a gush of wind brought a familiar aroma of 

dry heat, the ocean, and Mediterranean pine trees to

my attention and before I knew it, image after image

 flashed before my (closed) eyes.

I opened my eyes, ... the canvas was no longer white.

I saw a cornflower blue sky, a white chalked

''maison'', terra verte green pine trees in the distance,

a field with a mixture of yellow ochre, gold ochre and

different hues of sienna interspersed with blotches

of olive green.

The ''muse'' had arrived. I grabbed a bunch of different 

sized brushes, a palette, and then started to cover it with 

globs of colours that I had ''seen'' with my ''minds'' eye.

As if injected with an adrenaline shot, I ''attacked'' the

canvas. I stepped into my ''zone'', a place where time does

not exist, only pure experience, and started to paint. 

In the zone, there is no awareness of doing, 

there is only doing. Until, ...one stops.

And has a look.

Something was missing.

Of what, I wasn't sure.

Standing in front of the painting, I closed my eyes.

Suddenly I saw it.

What was missing was vermilion red.

I filled a small spray bottle with vermilion red paint

and then walked up to the painting.

Standing there, I was unsure of what my next move was.

 ''Nothing worthwhile was ever

achieved without an element of risk''  suddenly popped 

into my head. 

As if in a dream, I sprayed a red line at the bottom

 of the painting, then proceeded to paint all the sides

of the canvas with the red as well.

My heart was pounding. Had I destroyed the painting?

I could hear people saying: ''But, why did you paint that

red line at the bottom?''

Why? Because I wanted to paint a place,

 a place that was still, a place that

was beautiful and full of colour. A place with space for

the imagination to run free, a place that is absent of

the confines of any kind of judgment, and of

critical and limiting thoughts.

A place that I could visit when the world seemed

colourless, arduous, baffling and complex to the point

of appearing insurmountable.

And red, red is a colour that for me represents passion, desire, 

love, hope and strength.

''Red is the ultimate cure for sadness.''  (Bill Blass)

The Barfly.....are you having a drink or is the drink having you?

I used to see them on the way to the conservatorium.

The ''Barflies''.

Waiting for the doors to the pubs and liquor stores to open.

Reeking of urine, excrement and cheap booze.

Sucking on crooked cigarette butts, coughing, and talking to themselves.

Unkempt, unsteady, and unaware of the rest of the world.

Mere shells of who they once were;

Someone's dad, someone's mother, 

someone's sister, someone's brother, 

someone's son, someone's daughter.

Two doors down from where I live,

a mother lost her son to alcohol.

Her son's life had spun out of control due

to his drinking and standing before the court, 

the son was given a choice: jail or moving in with

his mother. His mother brought him home with her.

He committed to go to AA, to get control of his life again,

and his mother supported her son the best way she could.

She believed him when he said he was getting his drinking

under control. However, coming back home after having spent a few

days away with her sister, she found her son dead at the bottom

of the stairs. After his body had been taken away and the mother

started to clean out the stuff in his bedroom, she found

that the wardrobes in his bedroom were full of empty bottles 

and wine casks. 

Sadly, her son never managed to silence the ''siren song'' of alcohol.

It took his life.

There is a saying: ''First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, 

and then the drink takes you.'' (F. Scott Fitzgerald)

I find it problematic that there often seem to be

double standards when it comes to alcohol:

We know that alcohol abuse and misuse, is detrimental

in many ways to most societies, yet we advertise it, we sell it,

we serve it, we promote it, we portray it as a ''social lubricant'',

etc.etc.

We tell our children not to drink, although we ourselves do,

you are a wuss if you don't drink, you're a drunk if you 

drink too much, you're a ''lightweight'' if you don't drink ''enough'',

you're a ''party-pooper'' if you don't drink at all, etc.etc.

We condemn and judge those who we consider to drink ''too much'', 

too little, too often, too seldom. We drink when we feel down, when we feel happy,

when we feel angry, when we feel frustrated, basically, if we feel we need

to have a reason for drinking, we will find one.

We often find it easier to judge other's drinking habits, than 

to objectively view our own habits.

Occasionally we also use alcohol use as an excuse for bad behaviour:

''My bad, I was drunk, or Ignore what I said, I was drunk, or I am

so sorry I did that, I had had too much to drink, or It meant nothing,

I was drunk.''

We have warning labels on cigarettes and poisons, descriptions of side-effects on

prescriptions, but no such thing on ''drinking'' alcohol.

 (Beer, wine, whiskey, gin, etc.etc.)

If there was a label to go on bottles containing drinking alcohol, 

maybe it could

say this: 

So, here's my thinking:

Should perhaps those who make money out of selling alcohol

perhaps also be the one's picking up the bills for

the damage it does to society?

Or at least have to put warning labels on their products and

 be prevented from advertising it as something glorious

and fun?

What's your opinion?

Animals are not mankind's underlings.....they are our teachers...

Hiding behind some bushes with my camera aimed at a solitary

sheep slowly walking across the snow covered landscape, the sheep

suddenly stopped and stared right at me.

''Great pose,'' I thought and pressed the shutter.

(The above image is an ink and water color rendition of

that photo.)

''Let us remember that animals are not mere resources

for human consumption. They are splendid beings

in their own right, who have evolved alongside us

as co-inheritors of all the beauty and abundance

of this planet.'' (Marc Bekoff)

Horses hold a special place in my heart though I must confess

that I prefer to just admire them at a distance rather than to

mount one. I did try to ride one once.....but the horse had

other ideas and so proceeded to throw me off quick smart.

Sitting in the sawdust on the ground I decided to respect the horse's 

decision. 

Some of us may perhaps view animals as ''underlings'' to human beings,

that their function/existence is to serve mankind,

 personally however, I don't hold that view at all. 

I prefer Chief Dan George's view: ''If you talk with the

animals, they will talk with you, and you will

know each other. If you don't talk with them, you will

not know them, and what you do not know, you fear.

What one fears, one destroys.''

Imagine a world without birds...

Or gentle ''giants'' such as elephants or whales.......

Or mysterious and patient elks......

Or even critters that can ''out-weave'' even the most

of brilliant human weavers.........

I will let Albert Schweitzer have the last word:

''We must fight against the spirit of unconscious cruelty

with which we treat animals. Animals suffer as much as

we do. True humanity does not allow us to impose such

suffering on them. It is our duty to make the whole

world recognize it. Until we extend our circle of

compassion to all living things, humanity will

not find peace.''

(In case you are wondering, all the images are made by my hands.)

Instead of ''Get over it!'', how about ''Get through it!''......?

They say that the eyes are the window to the soul.

(The above image is a sketch I made with white

charcoal on black paper and then edited in Photoshop.

I can't really remember where I found the original image,

or how true to the original it is, but I do remember how

this soldier's piercing eyes made me reach for my sketch pad.)

While in a chatroom chatting with a war vet, 

he disclosed to me that he suffers with PTSD.

(Post Traumatic Stress Disorder)

''You know how PTSD is often described as a form

of mental disorder, as an illness, well, in my view,

it's not.

 PTSD is a ''healthy'' human response to very unhealthy and 

traumatic experiences.''

''Think of it,'' he continued, ''how ''healthy'' is a person

who is not affected by trauma, whatever that trauma

 may be?''

His words rang true to me and for days those words

kept me busy researching PTSD.

How do soldiers coming home from wars ''get over it''?

How do first responders cope and ''get over it''?

How do victims of abuse ''get over it''?

How do children exposed to bullying ''get over it''?

Which brings me to my topic; telling someone to 

''get over it'', (whatever ''it'' may be) is in my view

hardly ever helpful.

As far as I can ascertain, there is no ''statute of limitations''

on how long it should take for a person to ''get over'' something

that they experienced as a trauma/heartbreak/disappointment/etc.

As not all of us react the same way to trauma, it can be good 

to remember that some of us may need

longer to recover, to process, and to find our way forward.

Talking to someone about our traumatic experiences

can often be helpful, but, in my view, it needs to be someone

who is supportive, patient and caring.

(Having learnt the hard way that this is very important, I suggest 

choosing a person to confide in carefully.)

It is not easy to open up and talk about things that

still hurts, or make us tremble, or gives us ''flashbacks'',

but, sharing our feelings with someone else, it is possible that 

that someone else may be able to offer us a different perspective, 

a different approach, and a different way to make ''sense'' out 

of a difficult experience(/s).

Like they say; ''a burden shared is a burden halved''.

In my experience, life changing events such as; wars, natural disasters,

loss of any kind, violence of any kind, etc.etc., leave indelible

marks on our emotional (/physical) well-being and 

can seldom be fixed by us just telling ourselves (or others) to ''get over it''.

Pain, whether emotional or physical, tend to be hard to ignore

as it asks for our attention, for us to tend to it.

''Rather than telling ourselves ''to get over it'', perhaps

we should tell ourselves to ''get through it'', ''move past it'',

understand it, and learn from it.''

(Citizen Z)