Ilmastointilaite (Air Conditioner) 16″ x 20″, acrylic on canvas board

More and more, I find myself just letting paint be paint on a surface and not asking it to look like anyTHING. Even a version of a thing I’ve never actually seen in quite the way I painted it, like fish swimming amongst the high branches of tall trees.

I remember drawing the air conditioner in the art room in my high school in Africa. I thought the more I could make it look like that air conditioner, the better the drawing would be.

I think those were important exercises. They helped me learn to see what I was looking at. They helped me document something of the world, if not interpret it.

Now I don’t care much about air conditioners. I could indicate one with a few simple lines if it were important to what I was saying.

So I painted trees for a while, and then I put fish in them. Now I paint brushstrokes, and sometimes fish appear. I don’t always fight the urge to make one look more like a fish.

If I let the paint just be paint, with no preconceived ideas about what else it might represent, I’m sure the pictures will still reveal themselves when I lay still on my bed and stare at it on my wall.

Things I never intended, yet I painted them. Things I see that you may not, just as you may see things that I miss.

Photography is good at documenting what the camera sees, so the paint can relax and look like paint.

Beautiful glaze on a ceramic pot melts and goes through chemical changes in the intense heat of the kiln. It does what glaze does, and we see the beauty with its drips and crazing. In the same way, we can appreciate paint when it does what paint does, not asking it to always look like something it is not.

For some artists, I imagine signing a contract with a gallery would be a measure of success. I canceled my contract with a gallery, and it was long overdue. What a relief.

I performed my first wedding in 4 months. It was wonderful. Without boasting, can I say that is something I am really good at? And the endorphins… They all tell me how wonderful the ceremony was. They tell me, with tears in their eyes, that it was perfect, and that God sent me to them.

It’s kind of like drawing. I’ve done it so many times I could poo poo it. When you do something so many times, it becomes second nature.

If I draw a fish in 30 seconds and it looks good, it actually took me 60 years to draw that.

It’s not nothing. It’s experience.

I’m updating my home study, so I changed the batteries in the smoke detectors, checked the fire extinguishers, cleaned out the food trap on the dish washer (it was like dissecting an alien), ran the clean cycle on the oven, changed the filters in the Brita pitchers…. we even cleaned out my son’s closet!

Please send your positive energy in our direction. We will receive it with gratitude.

I’ve never been alone in my house for long. When I moved here, I was married, and we had two small kids. Then we had a baby. When the older kids graduated from high school, my wife left, and I still had Maddee here for about ten more years. Then I tried to fill the gaps. I tried dating.

I like to share my life.

I think experiences are more meaningful if I can share them with someone. I went on a trip across the country alone and drove right past the entrance to the Grand Canyon because there was no one to see it with.

The other problem is when you end up with the wrong person. A bad date, for example. There is something to be said for being alone.

Actually, there are things I like about being alone. Time to do projects without having to accommodate someone else’s schedule or needs. Or the way the house stays clean after you clean it.

I do like a clean house, but then I want to share it. What’s the point of a clean, dead house? It’s decadent. A big house for one person. Decadent and pointless. All it’s good for is taking a picture of. It’s made for a family, and so am I.

I think if I lived in this house all alone, I would just shrivel up. I don’t think I would have the motivation to do the things I love to do. Like when I went to North Carolina. I didn’t paint there. I didn’t write. I didn’t make pottery. I was depressed. I had the whole clean house to myself, and all the time I could want.

When Raymond and Summer came into my life, what can I say? They were my children. Like finding the puzzle piece that fits. It doesn’t replace the other pieces that also nestled into the contours of my life. Each piece does its part to complete the picture. And it’s not my picture. I’m just a piece fitting into Raymond’s puzzle, too. And Maddee’s. And Summer’s.

But as our case worker said, Raymond and I were a good match. We had an easy transition. I always thought this was because Raymond is so much like Maddee. Maddee always tells me how much she loves Raymond, and that he is perfect for us. Not perfect for ME. Perfect for US.

It has been four months since I last performed a wedding. It was a chilly day in October, and I remember standing against a rock cliff near the mouth of the Baptism River to try to stay warm.

Today the temperature is -20°. The couple relented this morning and agreed to move the ceremony indoors, and I am grateful. I ran my ski bibs and parka through the wash last night in preparation for the outdoor scenario.

These days, weddings are less common on my calendar, and those have smaller guest lists. So I am grateful for today. Happy to set out on this icy adventure, and feeling the warmth of love in my heart.

An ice dam that had formed elsewhere is melting in spite of the thermometer reading outside.

Weddings and adoptions are two ways families are formed by people choosing each other. They make a public declaration of their love and intentions of forever. Sometimes it happens along a riverbank. Sometimes in a church or ballroom. Sometimes in a county courtroom. Always in the heart.

Maybe the only thing I ever truly wanted in life was to have children. From the time I was a child myself, I dreamed of becoming and being a father.

It’s kind of funny. Because other people have babies they don’t want.

My children have come into my life by choice and determination, which grew quickly into love.

I’m 60, and I still think I have time. I still have room. I have room in my house. I have room in my heart.

Is there another child who has room for me?

Because we can meet at an entrance ramp on life’s highway with our individual histories, and lots to talk about. We can discover how similar we are and grow together from our differences.

I’m mentoring an astounding 14 year old cartoonist from St. Paul. I just want to say what a humbling experience it is to open yourself up to receive whatever gifts the universe may have for you.

I started this year hoping to mentor again, but not knowing how to make it happen. The local organizations I worked through in the past are no longer doing that here. Still, I felt I had something to share, and something to learn from being a mentor.

Out of the blue, I got a text from an arts organization in St. Paul that I worked with 26 years ago, asking if I would consider working with this young man.

Hurdles are made to be jumped over.

Distance? Pandemic? We’re learning that so many things can be done from a distance. True connections can be made from a distance without sacrificing quality.

We’ve struggled, but there are gifts in the world, too. Even this world, the way it is.

Ask for it. Be willing to receive it.

NEW EPISODES

Flash Meridian is back with new episodes after a year with no transmission being received from his space ship. My friend Bucket has been paying visits to both Flash and Mr. Pumpkinhead. You can check them out at flashmeridian.blogspot.com and misterpumpkinhead.blogspot.com

For most people, guardianship is not the warm fuzzy relationship it is for us. When Summer and I met, it was my intention to adopt her along with her two brothers. Unfortunately she aged out of foster care before we could reach adoption day. DHS and the court determined that she was not competent to sign an adoption release for herself. In an attempt to create permanency and family with Summer, I became her guardian, but in our hearts, I am her father and she is my daughter. The day I became her guardian, October 3, 2019, we changed her last name to mine. The judge asked me on that day if I could think of a less restrictive alternative to guardianship for Summer. I again suggested adoption, and of course that was not an option. I said I could not think of a less restrictive option. The court agreed and granted guardianship. I reiterate this to affirm that I understand the gravity of this relationship for a 20 year old woman like Summer. I do not take this role lightly, and I do not receive any compensation for it.

Guardianship by nature brings restrictions. It’s true that Summer needs supervision and support, but I think what Summer needs more than anything is unconditional and appropriate love and acceptance.

I tell Summer and all of my kids that there is nothing wrong with them. Everyone is different. Everyone has their own strengths and challenges in life. Because of this, Summer has a lot to teach me, just as I can support and nurture her.

I will advocate for her, I will march beside her, I will fight for her and I will love her always.

These cut-outs hung over my parents’ bed on the farm. I remember them being made, but I can’t remember where it was. They are in my bedroom now. Can you recognize me?