Quitters never….

So today I quit my job. Our circumstances have changed and now I’m going to stay home with the girl and focus on painting for a while.  I’m not really having any strong emotions most of the time. It’s just the thing to do, but at the same time, I can feel a chapter ending and a new one beginning. I have always been the primary breadwinner for my household… as long as I’ve lived on my own.  

I really enjoy teaching. I meet fascinating people who I somehow convince to trust me for some period of weeks and we have an experience together and then they go away. Most of them just vanish. Some have remained dear friends for years after we both left the campus.  When I’m not teaching, I miss that connection with people. I miss public speaking and being the “expert in the room” at least in some category for a few hours a week. It’s not often that it is actually useful to be able to specify the best punctuation solution for a complex glob of words. I’m much more gregarious in the classroom than I am in real life. 

I really don’t like having my time taken away from painting. Regardless of any financial issues, I am just a person who paints. Part of the reason I’ve worked so hard to sell them is that I just paint so much… and it’s the process that is vital to me. Once a piece is completed, I’d just as soon paint over it as anything. I’ve learned that people get a little upset when I do that, so I try to send them out into the world. It’s nice when that pays for my mortgage and whatnot.  I am really happy to be able to devote more of my creative energy to the canvas instead of the classroom.  

I do, of course, have all kinds of feelings about staying home with my daughter. She’s doing quite well and is a delight to be around. She’s just a good pal. Really. She’s very seldom a pain in the butt. It’s all very typical. I’m happy to be with her and trying to enjoy every moment as she grows and grows. And then there are the times when I’d do anything to get an hour to myself. Boring, really. 

 This is a recent painting. I’m thinking of going back to it and attacking it with more detail since, pretty soon, my deadlines are going to get a lot looser. What do you think? I stopped here because someone whose opinion I trust said that the impressionist vagueness was nice, but I like detail a lot too… 

Onward and upward

As always 

with love

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