Outside
the kitchen window of our home on Long Island, New York, it was a cold and
windswept November morning of 1970. Thanksgiving Day was approaching, and I
missed my family back in Ohio sorely. Oh, how I wished I could be with them;
but it wasn’t to be. I needed a distraction and decided the best way to
accomplish it was to lose myself in a painting. I gathered fall deco items I
had placed around the house and set them up on my kitchen table in a
composition I deemed worthy of a still life. A sheet of watercolor paper taped
to my board, and with my simple little pads of watercolor paints, a couple of
brushes, and a stick of charcoal to rough in the initial shapes, I got to work. 

The charcoal shapes came together easily.
As is typical of the way I tackle most jobs, I touched my paint-loaded brush to
the item on the paper that I thought would be the most difficult to render—which
was the stem of the pumpkin. My first attempt was a total bust, as was my
second and my third. By then, my heart was galloping in my chest with utter fury
at myself. I pushed away from the table and paced the floor—across the length
of the kitchen, into the hallway, into the living room, and back again and
again…pace, pace, pace…and then a voice sounded ‘round my ears. “Empty your mind
of what you ‘think’ a pumpkin stem looks like and paint only what you actually
see!” I had heard the instruction from my teacher in a painting class I had
taken years before, but obviously it had failed to register in my brain. I
returned to the table, emptied my mind, and painted only what I saw with my
eyes. Voila! In no time at all, the still life painted in a primitive style I
had hoped to execute appeared with what seemed very little further effort on my
part. It was almost like magic. 

I learned a big lesson that day, not
only related to the art of painting, but also to the art of living. Our
preconceived notions (opinions, prejudices, attitudes, and so many other
absolute doctrines we hold in mind) blind us to the truth of things.

With my humble painting titled,
CORNUCOPIA, I wish all of you an open-minded, a clear-eyed, and a very happy
holiday season.

Linda Lee

Here’s
a peek at multi-award-winning
author and artist Linda Lee Greene’s latest book, Garden of the Spirits of the Pots, A Spiritual Odyssey. It is a blend of visionary and
inspirational fiction with a touch of romance. The story unfolds as ex-pat
American Nicholas Plato journeys into parts unknown, both within himself and
his adopted home of Sydney, Australia. In the end, the odyssey reveals to him
his true purpose for living. The novella is available in eBook and paperback.

Driven by a deathly
thirst, he stops. A strange little brown man materializes out of nowhere and
introduces himself merely as ‘Potter,’ and welcomes Nicholas to his ‘Garden of
the Spirits of the Pots.’ Although Nicholas has never laid eyes on Potter, the
man seems to have expected Nicholas at his bizarre habitation and displays
knowledge about him that nobody has any right to possess. Just who is this
mysterious Aboriginal potter? 

Although
they are as mismatched as two persons can be, a strangely inevitable friendship
takes hold between them. It is a relationship that can only be directed by an
unseen hand bent on setting Nicholas on a mystifying voyage of self-discovery
and Potter on revelations of universal certainties. 

A blend of
visionary and inspirational fiction, and a touch of romance, this is a tale of
Nicholas’ journey into parts unknown, both within his adopted home and himself,
a quest that in the end leads him to his true purpose for living. 

AMAZON BUY LINK 

Multi-award-winning author and artist Linda Lee Greene describes her life as a telescope that when trained on her past reveals how each piece of it, whether good or bad or in-between, was necessary in the unfoldment of her fine art and literary paths.
Greene moved from farm-girl to city-girl; dance instructor to wife, mother, and homemaker; divorcee to single-working-mom and adult-college-student; and interior designer to multi-award-winning artist and author, essayist, and blogger. It was decades of challenging life experiences and debilitating, chronic illness that gave birth to her dormant flair for art and writing. Greene was three days shy of her fifty-seventh birthday when her creative spirit took a hold of her.

Garden of the
Spirits of the Pots is available in
eBook and/or paperback on Amazon.

https://www.amazon.com/GARDEN-SPIRITS-POTS-SPIRITUAL-ODYSSEY-ebook/dp/B09JM7YL6F/

Pastels
and acrylics painting, “Coppers” by Linda Lee Greene