A friend emailed me yesterday and said he had checked out my newest paintings and read my blog.  So that's maybe 2 people reading it. 

I have gotten lost in real-estate-land.  I decided that since my house was ready I would put it on the market myself.  I found a realtor who would list it on the MLS for a fee, but I had to be willing to pay any realtors, who brought me a buyer, a percentage.  Works for me.  I'd rather pay someone 2 1/2 % and represent myself.  Given how I feel about realtors, I don't really want one representing me anyway....unless, of course, it's Lea in Portland. 

I love my house.  It's a beautiful and colorful reflection of me.  This is where I learned to be at peace with myself through my painting.  If I could take this house and move it to Portland, I would do it in a flat minute.  However, that's not an option so I will continue on this path.

Yesterday was the first day on the MLS and I had two showings.  You should have seen me running around throwing stuff in cupboards and the garage.  To say I wasn't quite ready.....  I think showings will be slow in this market, but it will force me to keep my house picked up and neat.  One of these days, I may even start painting again.

I think it's easy to tell when I'm distracted because I don't write.  I got so bogged down in workmen and real estate agents it isn't even funny.  Now that i have all the painting and repairs done, I've decided not to sell.   That would be where the real estate agents come in.  No matter how much I like the agent, I think they are a bunch of blood sucking opportunists.  I was told I wouldn't get nearly what I wanted for my house; market is bad, it's too unique, blah, blah, blah.  So the idea is to sell my house for much less than it's worth and pay someone 6% to do it?  I don't think so.  If the market ever improves, I will put in on the market and I'm going to do it for sale by owner.  I'm not in any hurry so it won't hurt to get it out there. 

All this means that I don't get to shop for real estate in Portland.  Boo, hoo!  There's nothing that gets the juices flowing quite like the search for the perfect house.  The plan is to stay here and try to spend more time in Portland. 

Some day...

I have modified the painting Out My Front Door and posted it right above the first version. 

I'm much happier with it and I have some friends coming to help me hang it in my stairwell.  Essentially I haven't had any paintings up there since I had the walls repainted.  Now that I'm "staging" my house to sell, I have to make it look complete.

Essentially, this whole process sucks.  I've been packing away stuff, cleaning the garage, and trying to do the rest while the painters and carpenters are here.  I'm pretty well exhausted.  Looks like there won't be any time to paint for a while. 

As I predicted, I forgot most of the great thoughts I had the other day, but a new one or two have popped up.  Basically, I'm thinking about moving to Portland.  I love my house here.  I built it just for me and it has lots of studio space.  However, it also has half an acre to be dealt with and yesterday I found a lizard in my laundry basket.  It is beautiful, private and has a great view, but I'm tired of nature coming in the house.  

The biggest problem is that I can't afford to buy something until I sell this one and the market here sucks.  So...this won't be in the foreseeable future.  I do have an opportunity on a house in Portland, owned by a relative, that is empty and greatly in need of remodeling.  If I could do some creative financing, I might be able to supervise the design and construction and if my house here doesn't sell, I could try to sell the one up there.  The market up there is not as depressed as ours.

The best laid plans.....reading the paper about the economy scares the pants off me.  Time to elect Obama. 

Sometimes I have so many epiphanies that I can't narrow it down to one.  Then they all get lost.  So, I've decided to use this blog to see if I can't slog my way through the ideas that keep coming.  Some are holding me back and some are pushing me forward.  I think I need to pay attention to both because if I focus on what's holding me back, I can't be embracing the ones that move me forward.

I need to catch up with my thoughts.  I will start by what happened in California.  I received news that the painting I had entered in a show was not selected.  I have to say it really stunned me.  That was my best work.  I kept it to myself and ruminated endlessly on it.  Then my daughter, her boyfriend, and I went to a one-man studio/gallery in South Laguna.  It's one we've visited several times and once a friend of mine bought a piece of the artist's work.  The last two times he's not been in his gallery so we were left to peer into the windows at his work.   I've always loved his stuff because it's usually of water, ocean, sky, etc.  I would have thought the two paintings in his window were photos.  They were huge (maybe 6' by 7') and were of waves crashing on the shore.  They were stunning.  They also had been sold for $22,000 a piece.   The first time I was there he had a beautiful large triptych that was about $4000.  My daughter said his work had really taken off and I could see why. 

My epiphany is that I allow other people's opinions to dictate my artistic self worth.  This is not such a new or startling concept, but I see it through a different end of the binoculars.  I have been painting for the benefit of others so my work will be accepted and lauded.  That, I think, will make me really feel like an artist.  But what I really want is for my paintings to be like the song I'm listening to; Alanis Morrissette's Not As We (not to mention Torch and In Praise of the Vulnerable Man).  They are so beautiful I want to cry and my emotions soar.  That's what I want my art to do; but for me, not for anyone else.
 

I have two brand new canvases up on my easels.  I have cleaned the studio (anything to delay exercising) and I'm ready to paint what I really want even if it takes me a year to finish one.  I want to paint the sky again and the ocean; the place I love the most.  I will never be able to paint like the artist in Laguna and really I don't want to.  I want to paint what I want, the way I want.  I have no idea if I have the talent to do it, but I'm willing to try.