Fresh Paint

I had one goal this Tuesday in February. Honey Dew and Blue Lagoon.

I was in a fog last week, we had buried my step-dad and I was just getting my head around my loss when it occurred to me it was time to create something.  Plant a garden, paint a room.  Something. Focus on a project that brought me joy and created something lasting.  So this morning I found a gallon of Honey Dew paint and a pint of Blue Lagoon in the garage and I set forth on the downstairs bathroom.  We have lived in this house twelve years and it is the only room I have never painted.  The dirty white walls were screaming for attention.  Begging for new life.

Twelve hours later, I have a new room, a new spirit. Sure I haven’t showered and there is paint in my hair and the dog hasn’t been walked and I haven’t exercised but I have created something with color, attacked a project, just like my step-dad did many times, again and again.  Like my brother-in-law said during the eulogy…Hal remodeled a perfectly good house.  So this man knows creating.  And he did it with gusto.  I know he was with me today spreading color on the walls, adding life to a little room in a basement.

by J.G. McGlothern

 

What’s Next?

Visiting my step-dad at his nursing home this morning, a resident rolled around the floor in her wheel chair, alert and clear headed, asking a very viable question.  How long before something happens?, she asked the nurse dolling out medications to another resident.

About an hour, said the nurse sounding like she has heard the question before.

About an hour something will happen, she said out loud, wheeling herself out of the hall closer to other residents.

Still not satisfied, she asked those she spends her day with and who probably expect the question, Anyone know what’s next? It was 10:30.

Lunch is in an hour, a resident told her.

About an hour something will happen, she told herself again.

It’s the question I had on my mind this morning but probably for different reasons and definitely under different circumstances.  Like those I sat with at the nursing home, we don’t know what’s next, but unlike them I can make choices and decisions leading me to the next thing, whatever that will be.  What an incredible gift this life and yes how overwhelming and difficult it can be, but to be given the choice to make it a good day or crappy one is I a choice I get to make.  I don’t have to wait for something to happen, I can create it.

So what’s your choice today? What’s happening next?

by J.G. McGlothern

Thousand Words in a Picture

I just spent the last few days creating a photo album on Shutterfly.  I am one of these people who prefers doing things the old fashioned way.  Manual camera, photos printed at a shop, slid into photo albums by my own hands.

My husband gave me a digital camera for Christmas two years ago and I haven’t had film developed at a shop in ages.

In between caring for my family, I was like a Meth addict hiding out in our basement office cutting and pasting photos into the photo website.  Just one more photo.  Just one more page.  Stealing moments to change the background, adjust the layout and all with a click of my mouse.

I am five years behind on photos.  My almost 9 year old daughter has seven completed albums, all manually created, before digital and I discovered these websites that do everything for you. Page after page showing every outfit, milestone, facial expression, attitude, experience.  My 6 year old son?  He has one and a half finished albums.

I will be curious if my reaction is the same when I receive my newly created book in the mail.  Will it have the same feel and smells of creating an album from printed out pictures using my own hands to slide them into their sleeves?

I could spend hours looking at photos.  The faces of my children changing in a blink.  The images all reminding me of past moments, one time experiences, all captured on film.

I may get hooked on this new way even though I am an old fashioned girl at heart who still doesn’t text and prefers a hand written letter to email and a phone call to FaceBook.

In the end, new methods or old, a picture is a story and I get so much out of watching the story unfold in print.

by J.G. McGlothern