A Hard Woman

The media is interesting these days. It's been quite a while since I have sat down to write a blog entry and that is no mistake. I have been both busy and observant. Aproaching the past several weeks as the Season of Lent has been a helpful lense to look through as a Christian. Indeed, the majority of people on this planet would be hard pressed to not be able to odentify with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsamane. While the news and other media outlets have been reporting on the growing fear of a tiny organism, a virus, I have been going about my life in much the same way I have been for years now. I used to think I was just another creature from another planet. This is a joke. I am not delusional nor have I ever been. I do not actually believe myself to be an alien creature. But in all seriousness the biggest changes in my life over this time period have been: it's hard to find toiletpaper and a few other things at the store, some family members have actually decided I'm worth corresponding with, and we finally found a couple well suited candidates for our live/work exchange. I guess I've been living in "Pandemic Mode" for years now. I grew accustomed to it long ago. I wish no harm or ill-will upon anyone and I also accept that unpleasant things are happening in my community and communities around the Globe. 

Yesterday I completed the painting series for this Lenten Season, my personal tradition of the past decade. You can see the work on the Gallery page. Here is an image of the final piece still on the table right after I signed it:

It struck me as Omar and I sat looking at all of the works lined up next to each other how interesting it was that I had chosen this subject matter to look at this year way back in late September or early October of last year. And now...here we all are, holed up in our homes being jailed by threat of a tiny virus. Then this morning I was struck by another very ironic image from every day life. I recycle and up-cycle a lot of textiles as my personal practice. This includes buying a lot of my clothing second hand. It's better for the environment. As I took one such piece out of my closet this morning and laid it on the bed for when I got out of the shower I had to take a picture of what I saw:

In this run up to elections in this Country I didn't know whether I wanted to laugh or cry. It's hard to put a name on any particular emotion these days. Everything just seems so new and different...even my second-hand clothing.

ANYWAY...

With the paintings done I can focus on completing this year's novella. I hope to finish it by Easter, but it may take me a bit longer than that. In addition to the paintings and novella, there's been a lot of progress here on the Ranch. It's nice to have helpful and pleasant people to work with now, and it's also a little work to fall into new organizion and schedule having more people on the property on a daily basis. This year's novella is also a little more challenging for me to write. Whenever I'm working on a new work of literary fiction it takes some time to get to know the characters I'm writing. Just like real people, some characters are easier to know and/or get a long with than others, and it can be heavy to carry sometimes. But it's also rewarding. I finished Draft 1 of Chapter 7 earlier this afternoon. It's called A Hard Woman and it's posted with all the other chapters to date. You can read it here.

And of course, a person needs to eat. As usual, I've trying new techniques and making lots of tasty meals for Omar and I. This Mezza Platter with homemade flat-bread was particularly delicious:

The cous-cous was nice with the stewed collard greens and the chick pea fritters with the yogurt sauce was divine. I've made a few different styles of flat bread over the years, but I think I have finally perfected my personal style of flat bread using a combination of wheat flour and spelt flour. Omar is quite pleased as well. Bread baking is an interesting science. I also have been working on perfecting my sandwich bread techniques. These were particularly nice French-bread-style veggie pizzas I made last week using my sandwich bread:

And of course there's Brody! He is happy to have a couple new friends AND his Daddy working from home everyday. Had a small fire in the firepit the other day and Brody thought it was amazing:

Here's a link to a music playlist I made and have been jammin' out to. Until next time...I'm just doin' my thing and trying to stay safe and healthy. I hope you are too.