Wiggly Life with Tulips

Yesterday was one of those days....no, no, no, not one of THOSE days; just an ordinary day with expectations, and then the expectations were crushed. It was a day where I had set aside a time and prepared a still life to paint. Everything was ready. And then, by the grace of God, one of my daughters agreed to pose for me....and so I painted her instead. And the portrait was SO terrible, that I wiped it off and wondered if all of this was a fluke. Do I even know how to paint? Then, because the still life was prepared, I painted that, too. In my insecurity, last night I was whining and moaning about not knowing anything and Reese reminded me that I go through this process about twice a month -- wondering if I actually know how to paint....and then I dreamed about it. I actually dreamed about writing this blog entry (and the responses to it), spilling all of my insecurities about painting and wondering if painting/art is what I should continue to pursue....


So after painting my daughter and wiping all of the work off the canvas because the painting was grotesque, I painted a still life of tulips. The last time I painted tulips was several years ago. That time and this, the tulips kept moving and changing so much that they were hard to follow and paint. They wiggled. They weren't still at all. Who knew tulips behaved this way? So, instead of calling this a Still Life with Tulips, this is called a Wiggly Life with Tulips. It's 12" x 16" oil on linen.