December 19, 2018

Gradual procession through all the grays in the sky outside my window.

Snowed-out Lessons and Carols finally happened Sunday morning. It was sweet, and better, I think, than had it been a special evening service.

The second iteration of the AGMC concert was better than the first, and more richly attended. I believe we offered a real addition to the festivity of the season. High celebration at Avenue M afterwards. We brought the restaurant impressive added business, but also slammed the poor servers who received the wave.  “Just warn us next time,” Terri said.

Ruth said, “You’re the basso continuo that holds the group together."

Jack and Leland and I took down Night Wings and hauled it all back to my studio. Conflicting emotions about that. I was glad to have the work back, having felt a strange anxiety at its being spread across the North. I was glad to have THAT over with and the freedom to get on to something else. Yet, not one thing sold. I can’t believe that’s usual, even for a backwater like the Weizenblatt. NOT ONE THING. Hard not to attribute a sort of cosmic unfairness. I am HE WHO IS NOT MONETIZED. BUT, have painted well (and quite differently) all the mornings of this week. Tuesday an electric outlet in my studio burst into flames. When I pulled out the lamp plug that was in the burning socket, it caused a considerable blue-white explosion. I may have screamed, for the girls came running from their studios. Extremely tall people from Durham wandered through. The spiders one finds lurking behind one’s paintings are the biggest spiders I’ve ever seen which were not outright tarantulas. I try to concentrate on their elegance rather than their size.

Sudden flash to the fifth grade. We had a substitute, and I remember her looking out over the class and saying, “I have seen just about as much nose-picking as I can stand for one day.”  It was hilarious then; it’s hilarious now.