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Thanks for the moral support Kim and Lacey,
For a relationship with an artist to survive the artist's partner has to understand that art is essentially who we are. When I was married and raising my children (I am talking a period of twenty-some years), I NEVER stopped thinking about my art. Grade school art exhibits made me swallow and fight back tears!
Now that I am creating portraits again, I think of those years when my art was dormant and I am reminded of a story I read about a pianist who was imprisoned in the concentration camps in WWII. He said that what kept him sane was to continue to finger an imaginary piano. I think that every portrait I ever looked at during those twenty-five years I imagined a brush in my hand . . .
When I finally returned to my art I made a declaration to my children and to my large family and to my signifcant other, "I set my art aside for twenty-some years. I will never ever do this again. That means hanging up the old apron and tying on a paint smock. The dust ball will turn into tumbleweeds, preparing beautiful home cooked meals are a thing of the past except on special occasions, and there will be family functions that I will bow out of..."
Now, they are learning that I was serious and am still serious and I think my getting my own place brings me great resolve and peace. I had a great Monday yesterday, working on my next portrait.
My personal life will settle down to what is right and I will not have lost my sense of identity. There is no stopping me, whether I can ever make a living at my art or not.
And yes, we are blessed to have this passion, this work we all share!!
"It grieves me greatly that I cannot recapture my past...I can only offer you my future, which is short, for I am old" - Michelangelo
"A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be." - Abraham Maslow
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