New Directions

 

Today the UPS driver (to whom I am particularly grateful, as he was the sole witness to my auto accident a few weeks ago) left at my garden gate an arousing hard cover copy of Splashy 11 – New Directions. If you are a watercolorist you drool, gasp, or turn purple with envy at viewing each new edition in the Splash series.  This new hard cover begins with a quote from Proust: The real voyage of discovery comes not in seeking new landscapes but having new eyes.  What a good challenge for me!  These days my allergies keep me pretty much confined inside the house walls, while my heart and soul are yearning to be out in the garden, or traveling to far off places..   Enough excuses, Bonnie.  Get painting!

 On the creative writing front, however, I composed my first ever play this week.  Perhaps the word “play” is an exaggeration. It is really a skit, meant to illustrate the first three months of sorority life at the University of Washington for Shirley, Dolores and Bonnie in the fall of 1948.  As luck would have it we were randomly assigned to be roommates. We three have been good friends for 62 years now.  The skit is a farce about how the sorority attempted (and failed) to make proper ladies of us. It will be performed at a luncheon we are hosting on August 14 in La Conner, Washington to jointly celebrate our 80^th birthdays.  My friend Andrea from Hayward is going to be the narrator, and yesterday, after tacos at Chipolte, she helped me fine tune some of the lines and stage directions. 

 One of the closing quotes in Splash 11 is from Picasso. He says that painting is just another way of keeping a diary. Good thought.  So is blogging.

Today I had lunch with my friend and neighbor Emily who is a fabric artist.  She had just finished a course on dyeing silk, a brand new activity for her.  Her dining room table was covered with silk pieces dyed in so many different ways and colors.  Beautiful.  Ok, friends, I challenge you to write me this week about what direction you are about to try.  I want to know what you are seeing with your own new eyes!