A New Day

By Carrie Jacobson

This day dawned bright and sharp, the light fragile and pink, the field white with frost. The beauty of the morning startled me, woke me up, and I hurried to get my easel and paints, and then painted, standing there in the yard in my pajamas and a sweatshirt.

I hope that your days and your year dawn with such beauty and grace and power.

Mr. Owl

By Carrie B. Jacobson

Where the heck have I been? Texas, New England, and flat on my back with strep throat. But no matter, I’m home and getting well, and painting again.

At Wal-Mart the other day, I was waiting in a line at customer service (there were no lines at the checkout stations. Zero. A Christmas miracle – or just the way they run things down here).  I got talking to the man beside me. It was in the 40s outside, and windy, and we chatted about it before I pointed out that I was wearing only a denim jacket, and he wasn’t wearing a jacket at all.

“Sure is better here than where I moved from,” he said, and after a little bit more talking, he told me that he had moved from Monticello.

I told him we’d lived in Cuddebackville, and we laughed about the small-world thing, and confessed that we never hoped to live anywhere else but the Eastern Shore.

Those of us who live on the Shore love it. I love the light here, the pace of life, the friendly people, the beautiful landscapes.

Of course, life here is not without its drawbacks. It takes 90 minutes to get pretty much anywhere, if you want to see friends or family away from the shore, or if you want to shop at more exciting venues than Wal-Mart or CVS. It’s tough to ship packages from here, though the women at the print shop that does FedEx shipping are saving boxes for me to package my paintings. Medical services are perhaps not the best here, but where are they the best, outside of huge metropolitan centers?

So shopping and shipping and doctors might pose some problems. But the air is clear, people wave when they drive by, and our little town is quiet and peaceful and decked out for the holidays. Lights are strung across Main Street, and a Christmas tree stands in the gazebo in our little seaside town park. On Saturday at dusk, we’ll turn out to sing carols and celebrate the lighting of the tree, and we will shiver and rub our hands together as the wind blows in off the Atlantic.

October Morning, 10×10

By Carrie Jacobson

There is some sort of balance, it occurs to me, between the shortening of the days and the brightening of the trees. The vivid colors of the leaves, and the grasses and here in Virginia, the yellow soybean and red sorghum fields, these seem to make up for the lengthening darkness. And while it’s not an even trade, it’s often a good one. Sometimes, I think, the autumn colors give me more than the shorter daylight takes away.

I rise early, always, and these mornings, these dawns, seem long, and dark, and impenetrable. I do know that the sun will come up every day – but sometimes in these long dark mornings, I find myself questioning that certain fact. I will squawk and grumble along with everyone else when we set the clocks back an hour, but the early-rising part of me will rejoice. (Probably in secret).

Until then, I will glory in the colors of autumn, soak them in and think of them as added sunlight.

Early Spring
oil on canvas, 10×10

By Carrie Jacobson

One of the best things of this life as a painter is having the time, and living in the space, to be aware of the minutiae of the natural world, and the turning of the seasons.

Weeks and weeks ago, I saw the tips of the trees begin to redden. I’ve watched the buds shift to yellow green, and then to flowers and, in a second, it seemed, burst into leaves. I drive the back roads, slowly enough that I can notice the wisteria growing wild where, perhaps, a house once stood. Slowly enough that I can stop to help a turtle cross.

The daffodils are mostly passed here, except for in the shadows, but everywhere,  dogwood is blooming, pink and white, fragile and brilliant deep in the shady woods, and dancing at the edges, too. Azaleas – ludicrously loud! Ridiculously bright! – announce themselves all over town. Irises are blooming, elegant and spiky, and the lawn is already out of control.

Working for decades inside, I hadn’t known I’d lost touch. Now, I know I had.

Eagle Nest, New Mexico

By Carrie Jacobson

On Thursday, I turn 57. It’s not a monumental year, not a 40 or a 50 or a 65. It’s one of those strange ages – 32, 37, 43. Indeterminate. Unheralded. Not loaded with meaning.

At this edge of this unimportant age, I realize that I do not miss my youth.

I miss my young knees and my young skin. I miss the red hair that for so many years was the bane of my existence.

But the rest of it, I am glad to leave behind. The struggles to define what my heart wanted, and to show what my brain knew. The fight to get ahead, to climb, to earn praise and promotion.

These days, I realize more and more that I know less and less. I read things I wrote back then and wonder at what I knew – and what I was happy to imply that I knew. I think I was smarter then – and certainly, I was interested in seeming smarter.

These days,  I realize, I desire less and less. I buy clothes only when I need them. I rarely wear jewelry. For my birthday dinner, I’m hoping my husband will cook burgers and oven fries, and I’ll splurge with an extra slice of cheese.

I have no regrets, not really. I wish I had the money that I spent on clothes and jewelry and other fancy things – but that spending brought me many happy moments, and I don’t regret a second.

These days, these insignificant days in the middle of an insignificant decade, these days I’m happy to be doing the work of a lifetime, making art and selling it to people who are made happy by it.

I am happy with the today’s gifts: a gentle sunrise, a loving dog, a husband I adore, family and friends who pull me through the hard times. I’m happy to live in a small house in a small town in a beautiful place. And live a quiet little life, rich with faith and hope and the joy of making beautiful things.