Into the Dawn

By Carrie Jacobson

Once, I had a thought about the last car on the highway. In my mind’s picture, I drove along at night, stars above, the miles spinning away beneath my tires, and it was something I wanted, a feeling I craved, hurtling into the unknown, alone and silent, leaving everything behind.

Now, I realize that I was in a dark and lonely place when that picture-thought came to me. At the time, I believed I was OK.

Today, I think I’m driving into the dawn, not alone, but the last of those before me and the first of many to come. We might not see each other, we might not know each other, but we are traveling together on this road, and there is comfort and joy in that for me.

I wish all Zesters and all Zest readers the best of things to come in this new year.

On the Way to Warwick

By Carrie Jacobson

What a year this has been! What gifts I have received!

So often, I am on the way to one place, on the way to one destination, when something comes to me, out of the blue – and it is beautiful, or gentle, or thought-provoking – and it was nothing like what I was setting out to do, nothing like the destination I was setting out to find.

This is what happened with this painting. It was a crisp October day, and I was on my way to Warwick. This scene was so beautiful, I nearly drove off the road. I’d have given something precious to be able to paint it in plein air, but the road was narrow, and the shoulder even narrower. A photograph was my only bet.

Back home, I painted in the studio, and much in the way that I’d found this scene I had not been seeking, I found views and colors and resonances in the photograph that I hadn’t known were there.

In my mind, that makes it even more of a gift – because it’s something I wasn’t expecting, wasn’t seeking.

I hope that you all stumble on treasures in this new year. I hope that you seek, and that you find – and I hope that on the way, you find something else. Something wonderful that you weren’t seeking at all.

If you are interested in buying this painting, please contact me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com for price and delivery information. It is 36 inches by 48 inches, oil on canvas.

Paintbrush

By Carrie Jacobson

Early this cold morning, I was driving past an inlet where a skim of ice had formed, and it occurred to me that that is what it’s like to age.

We harden, bit by bit. At first, it’s just a little skim, along the edges. The sun will come up, the day will warm, and it will all be gone, forgotten, the surface moving and alive and sparkling in the light.

Then one day, one cold, cold day, the skim grows, until one edge touches another, covering the entire inlet.

Finally, it freezes solid.

I want to make sure that I never freeze solid. I never want to be so set in my ways, so sure of myself, so absolute, that all of me is frozen, edge to edge.

I vow, then, to wake every day and turn to the sun, and to warmth, and to the knowledge that while my mortality is certain, my stasis need not be.

Buddy

By Carrie Jacobson

In these short, dark days of winter, death seems to be crowding in. Friends and family have lost beloved dogs – like Buddy, here – and in my own life, three of our dogs seem suddenly, frighteningly old.

Time comes to all of us then, and here at the tip of winter, it seems more stark and more certain than ever.

It is no wonder that, in these long dark days, we decorate our houses with light, that we sing songs and gather together and cheer for life. We must! And we must never lose our hope, our faith, our belief that dawn will come.

Sunflowers, Tuscany

By Carrie Jacobson

I went to sleep last night, and everything felt OK.

I got up this morning, and after I’d been working for a while, I realized that my back hurt, just under the shoulder blade on my left side.

I started painting professionally and posting paintings to my own blog, The Accidental Artist, a couple years ago.

I was doing something on my blog the other day, and looked at a screen and learned that I’d made 500 blog postings.

(That also means 500 paintings… in fact, it means well more than 500 paintings, as they are not all posted).

I woke up just a while ago, and it was springtime.

Now, it’s the last day of November.

How life happens while we are engaged in living!

***

Sunflowers, Tuscany: Oil on canvas, 30×40.

Please email me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com for price and shipping/delivery information.

Nigel

By Carrie Jacobson

I am thankful today. I am thankful every day.

I am thankful to live in a world with sunshine and beauty. Thankful to have friends and family members I love, and who love me back, no matter what.

I am thankful for the dogs and cats who live with us, and who come into my life through painting.

I am thankful for the gift that painting is in my life, and for this amazing chance I’ve been given to start again, to start anew, at the age of 54.

I am thankful now to have a job, and an income, and to not be scared all the time.

I am thankful to be alive.

Mist Before the Mountains

It was a few weeks ago, a Sunday morning, that I had sudden free time, and went to paint with the plein air group of the Wallkill River School. On my way to the site, I was detoured by the remarkable morning mist. I checked out the WRS site, and it was lovely – but it did not compare to this view, this quiet silhouette.

There’s something about mist, about fog, about how interesting something becomes when it is obscured. Put a veil on it and all we want to do is see beneath that veil.

I’m reading a book that’s pushing me to be courageous, to acknowledge the fear and go on. I know from these past few years, making a living painting, what joy and exhilaration there is in doing this, in carrying the fear with me and going ahead anyways.

I will say there is also joy and security in a regular paycheck, and affordable benefits – but what we give up to get that joy and security!

Even in a life with those elements, and with far less of the freedom and liberty that an entirely self-directed day gives you, there’s plenty of fear, plenty of courage.

Behind the mist, behind the obscured, we are all creatures of spirit and emotion, passion and terror. It’s great to lift the veil now and again and peer underneath.

***

This painting, of the mountains outside Warwick, is available for sale. It is 11×14, oil on canvas. Please email me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com if you’d like to know more about price and shipping.

Blue Spruce, oil on canvas, 10x20

This moment is already gone, taken by the wind.

The long nights take one piece. The frost takes another. The rain another. And life turns, and we are etched and carved and whittled away, until finally, we are shaped.

Sadness runs its rough hands over us daily. The beloved dog, gone far too young. The missed opportunity, recognized far too late. The sense of could have done, could have been, could have gone, could have seen – these are cold words, and coldly, they have squeezed and pushed and pulled and left their marks on us.

I believe that joy is far more precious, far more light-handed. It signs its name in possibility. It is the surprising warmth of a winter afternoon, a dog asleep in a patch of light there on the kitchen floor, this is joy, dancing its quiet dance. It is a smile from a stranger, for nothing, lasting a moment, lasting an eternity. It is a memory, dancing free and sweet across the horizon of my mind – and joy is, some days, as simple and as definite as that horizon, long and steady and beckoning.

Joy says “Come try.” Sorrow says “Look back.” Somehow, both inhabit the fall.

“Blue Spruce” was painted near the Iron Forge Inn, in Warwick. If you’re interested in buying this painting, please email me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com for price and delivery options.

Petit Chien

The other night, honestly, I was feeling pretty low, and I’d been venting by sniping at Peter, who had seemed to be sulky and angry.

“Well you haven’t exactly been a bowl of sunshine these past few days, either,” he said.

Well, I hadn’t, I mournfully confessed, the tears rising. I was not enjoying my job. I hated being yanked around, told to do one thing one day and another thing the next. I was being pressured to finish the directory listings, like yesterday – a task I don’t like and am not good at. I don’t like this, I said, I don’t like this at all.

Most of all, I was feeling angry about the fact that these weeks of working have meant very little painting – and if I was looking at a future of very little painting, I was looking at a future I didn’t like much.

So what was I doing? Why was I working – in journalism, no less – when all I really want to do is paint?

I felt angry, I felt sad, I felt trapped, I felt sulky and whiny and miserable. I could hear my voice rising, and shaking, tears and frustration all wound together –

And then it all changed.

Just like that, I realized that I wasn’t going to quit this job, and so this, all this misery, all this whining, all this anger – it was just me, stamping my feet and jumping up and down, throwing a tantrum, crying “poor me.”

It was all optional, every bit of it.

The truth is, I have a job, with a paycheck and health insurance. Very soon, I am going to be done with the directory listings, and I’m going to be out in the community, meeting people and writing stories.

And I can make time to paint.

Sure, there will be many, many days when I have to do stuff I don’t want to do, when I have to follow instructions – even instructions I feel are stupid, pointless, hysterical. Yup. That’s why they’re paying me. That’s why it’s called work.

Peter and I, and our dogs, are worlds better off now than we were six weeks ago. And I am grateful, grateful beyond belief that I have an income, a way to make a living while I work to make a career.

——

It is not too late to commission me to make a painting for you for the holidays! Send me a photo – of a landscape, a beloved pet, a house, a garden that you love, and I will have a beautiful palette-knife painting for you within a few weeks. The commissions are rolling in, so do it sooner, rather than later! Email me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com and we can get the process going.