Carrie’s Painting of the Week
September Salt Marsh
By Carrie Jacobson
If my mother — Mary Ann Hook Cooper — were alive, this would have been her 85th birthday.
She’s been gone for six years now, but she’s with me, every day, every minute. She’s in the blood that runs through me. She’s in my long upper lip and my bad right foot. She’s in my taste for peanut butter, and she’s in my outlook and my optimism. My mother is in my love of color, my sense of adventure and my delight in laughter.
And she’s in my paintings. She is in the courage that it takes to start, and the tenacity it takes to keep going when – inevitably, in every painting – it looks like disaster is looming. She is in my love of the landscape and the creatures in it, in my love of color and movement and sense and sensation.
She is at my heart and in my soul, and she is in the heart and the soul of every painting I make.
Today, Mom, I miss you as I miss you every day. But today, more than anything, I celebrate you, and the beautiful, strong life you lived and which you shared with me.
Tags: carriejacobson, Mary Ann Cooper, mom, mother, oil painting
September 12th, 2012 at 9:13 pm
We live in each others heart.
September 13th, 2012 at 8:04 am
I believe that also, Bob, and am grateful for it every day.
September 13th, 2012 at 8:42 am
I was about to say I know how you feel, but this would be grossly incorrect. No one can know how someone else feels on the loss of a mom or dad.
JP
September 13th, 2012 at 8:47 am
Oh, I know, Jeffrey, in the particulars, we will never know what anyone else feels. But I do think that in the loss of our parents, maybe there are universal threads of feeling – at least in large swaths of the population.
September 13th, 2012 at 11:04 am
Dear Carrie;
Your wonderful words about your mother are very moving. You are very special and wonderful.
September 13th, 2012 at 11:19 am
Lovely piece, Carrie. Sometimes I am so surprised that my mother and father and all the elders are gone – they are so vivid to me still.
Jean
September 18th, 2012 at 12:32 pm
Hi Carrie,
Was looking for you and found you here, of course, at Zest of Orange. It’s a gray day, and I think your words (and painting) regarding your mother, are beautiful. They have made this balmy rain today somehow brighter, and helped me realize a gratitude in seeing my own mother who will be visiting me this week. Thanks Carrie!
p.s. – maybe a road trip to VA in store.
September 19th, 2012 at 10:21 am
Hi, Howard, and thank you so much for your kind words. I feel pretty lucky to know you, too, and think you are very special, as well. Hope life is treating you kindly these days.
September 19th, 2012 at 10:22 am
HI, Jean, and thank you so much for the note. I know just what you mean. My mom is so vivid to me, I can sometimes nearly see her standing here. We are lucky to have known them, aren’t we?
September 19th, 2012 at 10:23 am
Hi, Ellen! Thank you so much for the note, and your kind words. It’s a gray old day here today, too, but the air is soft and the colors are still lovely… You are so lucky to be visiting with your mom. Hope you have a great time, and that I see you in October!
September 28th, 2012 at 10:30 pm
Dear Carrie,
Thanks for the reminder of how precious our time with our parents is. My mother is 88 and although she needs a good deal of care and attention, I value our relationship deeply. Caregiving can be a chore or an honor…it’s not always easy to keep the latter in focus. Keep up your good work! Molly
October 3rd, 2012 at 7:18 am
Hi, Molly, and thank you for the note. You are so right about the joys and difficulties of caregiving. Sounds like you and your mom are lucky to have each other.