(photo by Catherine Massaro)

Sometimes the hardest thing to see is what’s in front of your eyes.

(photo by Catherine Massaro)

1. groceries

2. dry cleaners

3. water plants

4. catch up on emails

5. laundry

6. recycle

7. call mom

8. notice something beautiful

DON’T FORGET TO TAKE TIME OUT TODAY TO NOTICE SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL.

(photograph by Catherine Massaro)

I like to say that art is all about noticing things, making connections. I haunt antique malls for this purpose. It’s sort of creepy to some people, the idea of going through other people’s things. Voyeuristic I suppose, creeping around the edges of others’ lives by virtue of the things they left behind. Still, I am unapologetic about my habit, and find it an irresistable pastime.

It’s the same attraction I have to clotheslines. Clotheslines connect me to the past while grounding me to the present. When I hang clothes, sheets, towels on a clothesline, I’m my mom, my grandmother, and countless women who came before me doing this mundane chore. I’m a child again, and a grown up too. I’m a pioneer woman and a modern day version of same. I never, ever cease to enjoy the activity. I can experience how the sun connects us all, and  the basic things we all have in common, just from the simple act of hanging wet clothes on a clothesline.

And that’s not even the best part, as you all know. The best part is burying your face in that dry, sweet, sunshine infused laundry. There is an old Zen saying:  

After ecstasy, the laundry.

I think about this saying whenever I’m taking warm laundry off the line, and have to laugh to myself … because I’ve got it reversed—After the laundry comes my ecstasy.

( photo detail of LONG LIVE THE SUN, canvas collage by Catherine Massaro)

featured photo by Catherine Massaro

“The hardest thing to see , is what’s in front of your eyes.”

(detail from original oil painting by Catherine Massaro)

I wished for love – I have been loved.

I wished for money – it came and went.

I wished for a car – it was freedom!

I wished for long hair – then cut it all off.

I wished for a job – I got a paycheck.

I wished for a warm winter – I still do.

I wished for excitement – and found it.

I wished for a divorce – and got it.

I wished for peace of mind – daily.

I wished for wonder – and it surrounds me.

I wished for escape – and learned how to leave.

I wished for a studio – dreams come true.

I wished for New Mexico – days of heaven.

I wished for connections – where is my tribe?

I wished for friends – they give me joy.

I wished for a road trip – to never end.

I wished for my youth – and I got a grandchild.

I wished for a good nights sleep – and to die peacefully in it. 

I wished for art school – where I found myself.

I wished for a pony – but never got it.

I wished for my period – most of the time it came.

I wished for a girl – and got a boy, with no regrets.

( see ART tab for  WHAT I WISHED FOR  canvas collage)

featured photo by Catherine Massaro

We’re having a heat wave. Should be over 100 for the next 3 or 4 days. I’m waiting to see if it breaks a record in Death Valley as they are predicting. If you have never driven through Death Valley, though I would not recommend you go now (February is nice!) it’s a wonderful surprise, and very ‘desert’ beautiful. Plus you get to stand at the lowest spot below sea level in the U.S. The starkness of a desert landscape is so beautiful to me and I took so many pictures of the sand dunes. But it’s not for everyone. All of nature is beautiful to me though – I have yet to find a corner of this country that I did not find beauty in. Or maybe it’s through an artists’ eye, because after all … being an artist is all about noticing things.

(photograph by Catherine Massaro)

” Human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but … life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves.”

                                                    Gabriel Garcia Marquez