I was back from Dallas for a little over a week before jumping on another plane for another trip. This time Mark joined me and we took a red eye home to Indiana on the 3rd of July. Arriving on the morning of the 4th in Indianapolis (after a 4 hour layover in Detroit which allowed for serious napping in the lounge area). It was a busy nearly week we spent with family in the heat of the Midwest. From arriving and spending the 4th and part of the 5th with Ann Marie (Mark’s older sister and her girls) who lives in Noblesville (north of Indy) to driving up to Lafayette and visiting with my Mom, then Larry (Mark’s cousin) and girlfriend on Thursday for awhile before joining my siblings for a dinner as the “Wedding Whirl” of Melissa (my niece) and Josh began, we kept busy. Melissa planned a “simple and very elegant” small wedding at one of her favorite places…the IU Campus in Bloomington.
Friday we drove south to IU enjoying the small towns along the way as we took the more scenic route along Hwy 231. Even in the record setting Saturday heat with temps over 105 degrees, a lovely Mass at St. Paul Church was followed by a reception, which included dinner and dancing, at the Art Museum on campus. Thankfully the air conditioning worked well in the church but the 3 story atrium Art Museum was a little more difficult to keep cool. Mark kept visiting one of the galleries that was open for wedding guests to visit on the first floor mainly to cool off but the benefit was in talking to a docent he discovered TC Steele’s work, a noted Hoosier Impressionist painter. We had seen paintings of his while meandering through the Student Union earlier that day. The docent told him about TC Steel’s home and studio which were now an Indiana State Park and just up the road about 15 miles from Bloomington. We drove there on Sunday, as we left IU, and had our own tour of the grounds, studio and home he built at the turn of the century (1900). I kept thinking about how nice it would be to have a dedicated studio to paint in…to be able to leave your paints and paraphernalia out! Aside from the plein air painting I do (outside) my inside painting has always been while seated at the kitchen or dining room table (in Seattle) and now that I’ve moved to SF my kitchen table is it (no dining room in a small apt).
Inspired, I’m sure, by this grand barn like structure that was his studio, I returned to SF and got the idea that I could clean out my room that had held all my cards (prior to John the printer keeping my inventory) and create a space for me to “create”! Saturday found me clearing out, throwing away and organizing as I repurposed a 4′ wide metal shelving unit from that room to the kitchen closet and then brought up a cute little desk that I had garnered from Sarah awhile ago and had stored in the basement. By the end of the day, the kitchen closet was organized and I had my own place to create!
Now to get back to my painting/drawing discipline! more on that later…..In the meantime a few pics from the wedding and my Saturday efforts!