ARTFULLY MOVING IS ON MY MIND Artfully moving is on my mind. Surrounded by boxes and more than a modicum of disarray—packed and loaded and carried and unpacked and put away—I feel time moving forward into a new year in a new place and new experiences and new wonders yet to be discovered. Yes, after long stretches of singledom, in anticipation of our spring wedding, David and I are blending our two households into one. This is fun! |
Artfully moving is on my mind. Surrounded by boxes and more than a modicum of disarray—packed and loaded and carried and unpacked and put away—I feel time moving forward into a new year in a new place and new experiences and new wonders yet to be discovered.
Yes, after long stretches of singledom, in anticipation of our spring wedding, David and I are blending our two households into one. This is fun! This is when we’re at our best, for this is the kind of creative collaboration we both truly love and do well—especially the combining and hanging of our individual collections of art.
Always in our lives before we met, and in our time spent together through our courtship, we’ve surrounded ourselves and filled our spaces with art of our own making and gathering. Now together we’re artfully selecting and staging in our new home the artworks we most love.
My little artCentral green hatchback and David’s big white van, which sports decals including “US Navy Veteran” and “Kansas City Art Institute Delivery Vehicle”, are the purveyors of our personal and artistic wealth carrying his belongings from his spread in Lamar and from my wee Carthage cottage to our new home we lovingly call “Paradise” on Highland.
Back and forth we drive brimful with art and pots and pans and clothes and all the rest that necessitates overflow be strapped on top. The weather’s being kind. Mild temps and sunshine keep our energy up and our spirits high. We’re dipping into reserves of physical and emotional strength we’ve been cultivating for tapping. Though our muscles ache a bit at night, we’re high with the elations of manifesting newness.
On New Year’s Eve, after a very early morning start and a long day of toting, hauling and setting into place, together we sit in our new home’s salon enjoying a pause in our nocturnal scurrying. Gracefully our conversation turns to David’s self-portrait he made with oils on canvas as a student at the Kansas City Art Institute.
The painting sits temporarily propped beside a golden lamp on the old oak library table placed just inside our front door. The effect is stunning. From a background that’s exactly the same sage as the salon wall behind, a long-haired, dark-browed young man in a striped sport coat looks out at us as we look at him. He appears to be coming through the picture’s frame into the room. He is the premonition of the man who sits beside me—the man with whom I am artfully moving into a new life and the joys we share working together at artCentral for the art and artists we love so dearly.